For all that are living, the fundamental concept of life is living then dying. The two distinct pathways, living and dying, are vast and abstract filled with infinite stories, therefore act as perfect candidates for subjectivity. Due to the fact that life is an inevitable factor of all matters, numberless perspectives and opinions on the controversial subject derive. More specifically, death is inevitable to all that are living, and when topicalized effectively in a piece of work, it acts as a vehicle capable of carrying out the captivity of the creator’s perspective on the grand idea of life itself. So in a work, whether it be a playwright or a novel, a single idea ‘death’ represents endless factors. Throughout the history of literature,
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Miller launches the symbolization through death of the protagonist Willy Loman, a salesman of Brooklyn with his career on decline, utterly lost between the fine lines of personal hallucinations and the unforgiving reality. In Willy’s world, the reality crashes with his personal desire and longing for achievement in the modern society filled with corruptions and rotten capitalism. “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.” This is a line spoken by the character Charley, a neighbor and possibly the only true friend Willy possessed. Through the words spoken by characters, Miller shows the cold reality of society drenched in capitalism, in which only superficial factors that appear to the naked eye receive appreciation, and interpersonal characteristics are ignored. “Why must everybody like you? Who liked J.P. Morgan? Was he impressive? In a Turkish bath he’d look like a butcher. But with his pockets on he was very well liked.” This line alone represents Miller’s criticism of society swallowed by blind-sighted people mindlessly chasing after money. In Willy’s case, he is merely a victim of this blind society. He longs for love and affection from his family …show more content…
Scott Fitzgerald also used the idea of ‘death’ as a literary device symbolising the decaying society in his renowned work The Great Gatsby. Similar to that of Miller, he manipulates the plot’s climax toward the direction of a tragic ending, in which the protagonist Jay Gatsby gets murdered by George Wilson. “It was after we started with Gatsby toward the house that the gardener saw Wilson’s body a little way off in the grass, and the holocaust was complete.” The ‘holocaust’ in this context describes the falling of Gatsby, along with Wilson’s suicide. The ironic twist in the tragedy is the fact that Wilson believed Gatsby to be responsible for his wife Myrtle’s affair and death, however this was a suspicion far from the fact. Nick Carraway, the actual narrator of the story, depicts all characters of the novel, including Tom and Daisy Buchanan as “a rotten crowd”, while Gatsby “worth the whole damn bunch put together” . From this context, Fitzgerald is indirectly conveying the ‘rotten’ society drenched in American Dream through the eyes of Nick. Furthermore, Fitzgerald cleverly inserts a reference from Benjamin Franklin’s The Autobiography , to depict Gatsby as merely a romantic man eager in chasing his dreams, following the example of Benjamin Franklin’s set of daily routine. This implies that both Miller and Fitzgerald manipulated the destiny of the protagonist to victimize him of brutal society. In addition, similar to that of Willy Loman’s barren funeral, Gatsby’s
Miller launches the symbolization through death of the protagonist Willy Loman, a salesman of Brooklyn with his career on decline, utterly lost between the fine lines of personal hallucinations and the unforgiving reality. In Willy’s world, the reality crashes with his personal desire and longing for achievement in the modern society filled with corruptions and rotten capitalism. “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.” This is a line spoken by the character Charley, a neighbor and possibly the only true friend Willy possessed. Through the words spoken by characters, Miller shows the cold reality of society drenched in capitalism, in which only superficial factors that appear to the naked eye receive appreciation, and interpersonal characteristics are ignored. “Why must everybody like you? Who liked J.P. Morgan? Was he impressive? In a Turkish bath he’d look like a butcher. But with his pockets on he was very well liked.” This line alone represents Miller’s criticism of society swallowed by blind-sighted people mindlessly chasing after money. In Willy’s case, he is merely a victim of this blind society. He longs for love and affection from his family …show more content…
Scott Fitzgerald also used the idea of ‘death’ as a literary device symbolising the decaying society in his renowned work The Great Gatsby. Similar to that of Miller, he manipulates the plot’s climax toward the direction of a tragic ending, in which the protagonist Jay Gatsby gets murdered by George Wilson. “It was after we started with Gatsby toward the house that the gardener saw Wilson’s body a little way off in the grass, and the holocaust was complete.” The ‘holocaust’ in this context describes the falling of Gatsby, along with Wilson’s suicide. The ironic twist in the tragedy is the fact that Wilson believed Gatsby to be responsible for his wife Myrtle’s affair and death, however this was a suspicion far from the fact. Nick Carraway, the actual narrator of the story, depicts all characters of the novel, including Tom and Daisy Buchanan as “a rotten crowd”, while Gatsby “worth the whole damn bunch put together” . From this context, Fitzgerald is indirectly conveying the ‘rotten’ society drenched in American Dream through the eyes of Nick. Furthermore, Fitzgerald cleverly inserts a reference from Benjamin Franklin’s The Autobiography , to depict Gatsby as merely a romantic man eager in chasing his dreams, following the example of Benjamin Franklin’s set of daily routine. This implies that both Miller and Fitzgerald manipulated the destiny of the protagonist to victimize him of brutal society. In addition, similar to that of Willy Loman’s barren funeral, Gatsby’s