Obedience to the American Dream Arthur Miller won the Pulitzer Prize for drama, married Marilyn Monroe, and has been praised as one of the best American playwrights. However, contrary to his successes, he struggled as a father and husband; he hid his son who suffered from Down’s syndrome for forty years and briefly married three different women during his life. His confusion between his role as a father and his expectation as a successful playwright parallels his examination of the American Dream in Death of a Salesman. In the play, Miller not only criticizes the capitalism of the American Dream but also questions its definition of success. In 1949, when the play was written, the American Dream was to have a happy family, big house, and fulfilling job; Miller questions this definition by reflecting on the failure of these three facets through the figure of Willy Loman, arousing the readers’ sympathy for Willy’s inability to be a responsible leader of his family, a monetarily prosperous homeowner, and a proud salesman. Willy’s belief that having a happy family is achieving the American Dream betrays him as he loses responsibility as the leader of his family. Willy believes that he needs to have a happy family to succeed in his “beautiful town” by getting respect from “upstanding people” (19). In order to achieve respect from his sons, he pretends that he is well-liked: “The man who makes an appearance in the business world is the man who gets ahead. Be liked and you will never want. You take me, for instance. I never have to wait in line” (21). His pretense in front of his family illustrates his desire to fulfill the paternalistic aspect of his American Dream. He has a misconception that a father needs to take all the responsibility for his family. This burden of paternalism leads him to manipulate his appearance even to his family, and his pretense expands into a deception of his family members. Pretending to sacrifice his whole life for his family, Willy cheats on Linda and gives her stockings to his mistress, and Biff expresses his sense of betrayal: “[His tears break through and he rises to go]” (95). Biff’s tears show that his image of Willy is collapsing; Willy fails as an example for his son, which means he is a failure as a responsible father. Willy realizes his failure when Bernard questions him about Biff’s depression: “[Willy stares in silence]” (72). Arthur Miller uses the stage direction of “silence” to embody Willy’s realization that his act of betrayal has been passed on to Biff. Willy’s cheating on Linda and Biff’s “[stealing] Bill Oliver’s fountain pen” (86) are interchangeable, dishonest actions which signify Willy’s corruption of Biff. Willy’s failure to be faithful to his wife parallels Biff’s failure to be honest in pursuit of his ownAmerican Dream. Through the interconnection of their failures, Arthur Miller underlines the unremitting inheritance of failure, which suggests the absence of equal opportunity in America. Biff’s revelation of Willy’s feigned pretense conveys Arthur Miller’s message about the cyclical nature of failure: “I am not a leader of men, Willy, and neither are you” (104). Biff indicates that he has inherited his inferiority from his father; at this point, Willy is no longer perceived as responsible. However, Arthur Miller does not simply depict Willy’s failure and his family members’ disappointment in him; the author arouses the audience’s sympathy for Willy. Willy’s failure represents the audience’s own failure to achieve its American Dream. Therefore, Arthur Miller, by showing Willy’s decline as a responsible father and parent, awakens the audience to his idea that paternalism is not needed for the happiness of a family. Arthur Miller critiques not only the paternalistic but also the monetary requirement of the American Dream by portraying Willy’s desire to own “the SALESMAN’S house” (1). His “SALESMAN’S house” represents Americans’ desire to own a fine house; the ownership of a house represents the stability of family life. Willy has spent his whole life for his family, and the house symbolizes his efforts: “Well, that’s a great thing. To weather a twenty five-year mortgage is” (54). The “25 year mortgage” has a meaning beyond its financial cost; the “25 years” is the amount of time he has dedicated his life in business. His experience and pride in his work are shown through his house; furthermore, Willy shows his consistent devotion to his family by fixing the house: “Did you see the ceiling I put up in the living room?” (30). That he fixes the house signifies his ownership of the house. However, the paying off of the mortgage and fixing the house belie his ability to achieve the American Dream. Arthur Miller shows the reality of Willy’s failure to pay for his house without the money from insurance when his Linda mourns the loss of her husband: “Forgive me, dear. I can’t cry…I made the last payment on the house today. Today, dear, And there’ll be nobody home” (112). Willy commits suicide as a final desperate attempt to fulfill his responsibility as a father by achieving the home ownership for his family through the insurance on his life; Willy gives up his American Dream for his family. Linda is not only talking to Willy but also enabling his family to finally pay off the mortgage and gain the ownership of the house. Arthur Miller, as Linda, is warning the audience about the price paid for the American Dream. A house is one of the basic needs of a human being, yet most people do not own their houses outright. They need mortgages to afford them. Arthur Miller points out the irony of a capitalistic society in which people mortgage their houses to pretend to achieve the American Dream. Therefore, under a system in which home ownership is a measure of success, society forces people to dream of having their own houses, yet people fail to achieve the dream, or like Willy, take an extreme path to achieve it. To reach his dream of home ownership, Willy spends his whole life in an unfulfilling job for which he feels spurious pride. To his family, he expresses his sense of dignity in his job with his philosophy of manliness: “The man knew what he wanted and went out and got it! Walked into a jungle…” (36). He holds faith in the idea that in America, one can get rich quick through adventuring in business. He even considers the adventure of a businessman to be manly while considering himself to be surviving in the “jungle,” However, as the story progresses, the audience realizes that his adventure is his confusion. When Willy asks his boss to let him work in New York, Howard awakens Willy from Willy’s own image of himself: “Kid, I can’t take blood from a stone” (61). The “Stone” signifies the futility of Willy’s dedication to his work, suggesting that Willy is not an adventurous business man but a “kid” who is lost in “jungle.” Willy furiously reacts to Howards’ words: “You can’t eat the orange and throw the peel away- a man is not a piece of fruit!” (61). By depicting Willy’ feeling of betrayal in his life-long job, Arthur Miller shows the hollowness of “false pride” in being a salesman (63). Arthur Miller’s criticism of the pride of a salesman is prominent in Willy’s admiration for Dave Singleman: “ I realized that selling was the greatest career a man could want ‘Cause what could be more satisfying than to be able to go, at the age of eighty-four, into twenty or thirty different cities…” (61). The contradiction between the situations of Dave and Willy signifies the absence of sense of accomplishment in Willy’s job; unlike Dave, Willy wants to settle in one city, is tired of work, and is not satisfied with his salary. Arthur Miller explains that a salesman is evaluated based on the most recent profit the salesman makes. The degree of success for a salesman is not dependent on his or her honesty, perseverance, or loyalty but on the profit that one makes; the job does not encompass a sense of achievement of the American Dream. Arthur Miller, as Charley, characterizes a salesman: “The only thing you got in this world is what you can sell. And the funny thing is that you’re a salesman, and you don’t know that” (75). He is defining a salesman as an unfulfilling moneymaker who does not know what he or she does. Thus, by personifying a salesman as Willy, who is betrayed by the job to which he has dedicated his whole life, Arthur Miller questions the audience’s acceptance of professional fulfillment based on being a salesman. Since Arthur Miller finds a sense of nihilism in his dedication to monetary prosperity rather than his family’s happiness, he casts suspicion on the significance of these conditions for the attainment of the American Dream: paternalism, wealth, and fulfillment. His suspicion has been realized as broken families, the mortgage crisis, and dead-end jobs are evident in modern America. He does not redefine the definition of the American Dream but awakens Americans who are living in the “[Land of] Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness” which is stated in Declaration of Independence. Therefore, through his criticism, he suggests that Americans listen to their individual dreams rather than follow the dream defined for them.