Rhetorical Questions For Death Of A Salesman

The song lyrics from “Dream” by Imagine Dragons concisely summarizes what the Loman family experienced, as “[they] all are living in a dream, / But life ain’t what it seems / Oh everything’s a mess” (8-11). The false realities were especially intensified by their beliefs on appearances, as the family emphasized superficial qualities of people and objects, rather than their genuine qualities, furthering their demise. Arthur Miller, author of Death of a Salesman, emphasizes that by only considering appearances, people will only deceive and hurt themselves. Miller promotes this message through literary devices, including rhetorical questions and idioms. An encounter with a girl leaves Happy, son of Willy, in awe: “Isn’t that a shame now? A beautiful girl like that? That’s why I can’t get married” (Miller 2.462). The rhetorical questions from Happy emphasize his belief that he only judges women from their appearances. He even falsifies his appearance to boast himself by claiming he’s a salesman—though this is …show more content…
Biff explains that they are a dime a dozen, meaning that they are just like any other ordinary people. Willy, stuck in the false reality he created through his false image, was not satisfied with the words from his son and responded: “I am not a dime a dozen! I am Willy Loman, and you are Biff Loman!” (2.886).Willy states their names in that fashion to show how he believes that their name holds significance, and to show how severely Willy overestimated his popularity. By the end of the play, Willy’s false reality has caught up to him, as he decides his best course of action was to kill himself in order to provide insurance money for the others. Miller uses this incident to highlight that there are consequences by only taking appearances into