What Is Linda's Role In Death Of A Salesman

Presented as convivial, profound and sincere, Linda is indubitably a strong, complex and supportive side-character in ‘Death of a Salesman’, who has great significance, therefore provided us with the means to understand the woes of Willy; our tragic hero. Linda’s love being a strength is my opinion, but I will provide an argument for how her character may be perceived as either strong or weak. Miller’s opening stage direction of her was ‘most often jovial, she has developed an iron repression of her exceptions to Willy’s behaviour’. Not only was Linda a kind-hearted and cheerful individual, she was incredibly loyal and strong at her emotional core. An ‘iron repression’ suggests that although she may not have favoured the act of looking past …show more content…
This loyalty and trust of her husband made her a very strong person and character, and it is conceivable that Miller wanted to portray her in such a fashion. In order to stay by someone, regardless of the knowledge you have of their inevitable downfall and spiralling into insanity as Linda showed towards the end of the first Act when she spoke up about Willy wanting to kill himself, one must truly love them. Loving Willy despite his decaying condition and shortcomings took courage and strength on Linda’s behalf. Devoted to him, Linda would see him through until his end, never giving up on him although his zealous attempts at success made his inability and fate evident. Through this the audience can see that she may be considered a strong character, provided, all stated above also gives evidence to her being …show more content…
Women were not to compete with men for jobs but however were to become homemakers, doing all the cooking, cleaning, and caring for children, therefore creating a comforting family environment. As the women did not have any power they were considered weaker than men. Linda’s actions were fitting for this time period as she allowed Willy to speak over her and to have the upper-hand on all decisions. Linda supported Willy’s dreams, which ultimately supported the act of the unfolding tragedy within the play. As Linda was too weak to act upon this, she was a cause of Willy’s death, if not one of the main causes. She couldn’t bring herself to take away the rubber pipe: one of the potential causes of his death. The rubber pipe gives Willy the power to kill himself, resulting in one of the only powers he possessed in the play’s entirety. Linda lacked any courage to take it away as her love for him controlled her, telling her to not do anything about it which stopped her from ever speaking up. Not taking the length of pipe away was submitting to Willy’s power on the household and also to the obvious death he was to