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Study Guide

Death of a SaleSman

By Arthur Miller • Directed by Brian McEleney

Theater Audience Etiquette 1

Using the Guide in the Classroom 2

Unit One: Background Information

About the Playwright 3

The Characters and Setting 6

A Conversation with Brian McEleney 7

World of the Play 9

Major Themes 10

The American Dream, Then and Now 11

A Summary of Death of a Salesman 12

Unit Two: Entering the Text

Exercise One: Two Truths and a Lie 13

Exercise Two: The Great Game of Power

Exercise Three: Who Tells Your Story?

Exercise Four: Compelling Memories

Exercise Five: Your Dream, My Dream 14

Exercise Six: This is Us

Exercise Seven: Hashtag Finsta

Exercise Eight: Fishbowl Discussion 15

Exercise Nine: Read Aloud-Monologues

Bibliography 17

Table of Contents

Support for Trinity Rep’s education programs comes from: Rhode Island State Council on the Arts and General Assembly of Rhode Island; The Norman and Rosalie Fain Family Foundation; Shakespeare in American Communities, a program of the National Endowment for the Arts in partnership with Arts Midwest; The Yawkey Foundations; Hasbro Children’s Fund; McAdams Charitable Foundation; Otto H. York Foundation; Textron Inc.; Billy Andrade and Brad Faxon Charities for Children; National Grid; Phyllis Kimball Johnstone & H. Earl Kimball Foundation; Mary Dexter Chafee Fund; Southwest Airlines; Victoria Irene Ball Fund for Arts Education; Pell Fund for Education; Many Individual Donors; and gifts to Trinity Rep’s Annual Fund.

Prepared by Trinity Rep’s Education Department, Fatima Faris, and Gillian Gurganus; designed by Priscilla Parisa.

201 WASHINGTON STREETPROVIDENCE, RI 02903

PleaSe ReaD CAREFULLY AND GO OVER WITH YOUR CLASSES BEFORE THE SHOW

TEACHERS:Speaking to your students about theater etiquette is ESSENTIAL. Students should be aware that this is a live performance and that they should not talk during the show. If you do nothing else to prepare your students to see the play, please take some time to talk to them about theater etiquette in an effort to help the students better appreciate their experience. It will enhance their enjoyment of the show and allow other audience members to enjoy the experience. The questions below can help guide the discussions. Thank you for your help and enjoy the show!

Theater Audience Etiquette and Discussion

ETIQUETTE:What is the role of the audience in a live performance? How is it different from seeing a film? Why can’t you chew gum or eat popcorn at a live theater performance? Why can’t you talk? What can happen in live theater that cannot happen in cinema?

Reiterate that students may not chew gum, eat, or talk during the performance. Please make sure all cell phones and pagers are turned off. Recording devices and cameras are strictly prohibited. If there is a disturbance, they will be asked to leave and the class will not be invited back to the theater. Students may not leave the building during intermission.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS BEFORE SEEING THE SHOW AT TRINITY REP

What are the differences between live theater and cinema? (Two dimensional vs. three dimensional; larger than life on the screen vs. life-size; recorded vs. live, etc.) Discuss the nature of film as mass-produced, versus the one-time only nature of live performances. Talk about original art works versus posters. Which do they feel is more valuable? Why?

Observation #1:When you get into the theater, look around. What do you see? Observe the lighting instruments around the room and on the ceiling. Look at the set. Does it look realistic or abstract? Try to guess how the set will be used during the show.

Observation #2: Discuss the elements that go into producing a live performance: The lights, set, props, costumes, and stage direction. All the people involved in the “behind the scenes” elements of the theater are working backstage as the play unfolds before the students’ eyes. Tell them to be aware of this as they watch the show. Observe the lighting cues. How do special effects work? How do the actors change costumes so fast?

Actors in a live performance are very attuned to the audience and are interested in the students’ reactions to the play. Ask the students to write letters to the actors about the characters they played and to ask questions of the actors.

Send these letters to: Trinity Repertory Company, c/o Education, 201 Washington St., Providence, RI 02903 or email to: [email protected].

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A Letter from School Partnerships Manager Matt Tibbs

Using this study guide in your classroom

Welcome to Trinity Rep and the 51st season of Project Discovery! The education staff at Trinity Rep had a lot of fun preparing this study guide, and hope that the activities included will help you incorporate the play into your academic study. It is also structured to help you to introduce performance into your classroom through the following elements:

• Community Building in Your Classroom• Inspiration and Background on the Artist• Entering and Comprehending Text• Creating Text for Performance• Performing in Your Class• Reflecting on Your Performance

Trinity Rep’s Project Discovery student matinees help high school students in the following common core areas (for more information on the National Core Arts Standards, visit http://nationalartsstandards.org/):

• Initiate and participate effectively in a ranges of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grades 9-10 topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively (CCS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.1)• Analyze how complex characters (e.g., those with multiple or conflicting motivations) develop over the course of a text, interact with other characters, and advance the plot or develop the theme (CCSS. RL.9-10.3)• Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in the text, including figurative and connotative meanings; analyze the cumulative impact of specific word choices on meaning and tone (CCSS.RL.9-10.44)• Investigate how cultural perspectives, community ideas, and personal beliefs impact a drama/theater work (TH: Cn10.1.I.)• Analyze and compare artistic choices developed from personal experiences in multiple drama/ theater works (TH: Re8.1.I.)• Respond to what is seen, felt, and heard in a drama/ theater work to develop criteria for artistic choices (TH: Re7.1.I.)• Evaluate and analyze problems and situations in a drama/ theater work from an audience perspective (TH: Re9.1.I) Enjoy the show!

Matt Tibbs, School Partnerships Manager

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Arthur Miller was born on October 17, 1915, in New York City, the second of Isidore and Augusta

Barnett Miller’s three children. His father had come to the United States from Austria-Hungary and ran a small coat-manufacturing business. His mother, a native of New York, had been a public school teacher. Only after graduating from high school in 1932 did Miller think about becoming a writer, when he read Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s (1821–1881) The Brothers Karamazov. Miller attended City College in New York for two weeks, then worked briefly with

his father and in an auto parts warehouse to earn money to attend the University of Michigan. He

enrolled there two years later, continuing to work as a dishwasher and as a night editor at

a newspaper to help pay his expenses while he studied drama. He graduated in 1938, having won several awards for playwriting. Miller returned to New York City to a variety of jobs, including writing for the Federal Theater Project, a government-sponsored program that ended before any of his work could be produced. Because of an old football injury, he was rejected

from military service, but he was hired to tour army camps to collect material for a

movie, The Story of G. I. Joe. His notes from these tours were published as Situation Normal

(1944). That same year the Broadway production of his play The Man Who Had All the Luck opened,

closing after four performances. In 1945 his novel Focus, an attack on anti-Semitism, appeared. Miller’s career blossomed with the opening of All My Sons on Broadway in 1947. The play, a tragedy, won three prizes and fascinated audiences across the country. Then Death of a Salesman (1949) brought Miller the Pulitzer Prize for drama, international fame, and an estimated income of two million dollars. The words of its hero, Willy Loman, have been heard in at least seventeen languages as well as on movie screens everywhere.


About the Playwright

aRthuRMILLER

*Adapted from the Encyclopedia of World Biography

above: a young arthur miller

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By the time of Miller’s third Broadway play, The Crucible (1953), audiences were ready to accept his belief that “a poetic drama rooted in American speech and manners” was the only way to produce a tragedy out of the common man’s life. The play was set in Salem, Massachusetts, in 1692, a time when many people were accused of being witches and were burned alive and hung. Miller’s play pointed out how similar those events were to Senator Joseph McCarthy’s (1909–1957) investigations of anti-American activities during the early 1950s, which led to wild accusations against many public figures. Miller himself was called before the

House Committee on Un-American Activities in June 1956 and was asked to give the names of guilty parties. He stated, “My conscience will not permit me to use the name of another person and bring trouble to him.” He was convicted of contempt of Congress, but the conviction was reversed in 1958. Two of Miller’s one-act plays, A View from the Bridge and A Memory of Two Mondays (1955), were social dramas focused on the inner life of working men; neither had the power of Death of a Salesman. Nor did his film script, The Misfits (1961). His next play, After the Fall (1964), was based on his own life. Incident at Vichy (1965), a long, one-act play based on a true story set in France during World War II, examined the nature of guilt and the depth of human hatred. In The Price (1968) Miller returned to domestic drama in his portrayal of a tight, intense struggle between two brothers, almost strangers to each other, brought together by their father’s death. It is Miller at the height of his powers, cementing his position as a major American dramatist. But The Price proved to be Miller’s last major Broadway success. His next work, The Creation of the World and Other Business, was a series of comic sketches first produced on Broadway in 1972. It closed after only twenty performances. All of Miller’s works after that premiered outside of New York. Miller staged the musical Up From Paradise (1974) at the University of Michigan. Another play, The Archbishop’s Ceiling, was presented in 1977 at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. In the 1980s Miller produced a number of short pieces. The American Clock was based on Studs Terkel’s (1912–) history of the Great Depression (a slump in the country’s system of producing, distributing, and using goods and services that led to almost half of the industrial workers in the country losing their jobs during the 1930s). Elegy for a Lady and Some Kind of Story were two one-act plays that were staged together in 1982. Miller’s Danger, Memory! was composed of the short pieces I Can’t Remember Anything and Clara. All of these later plays have been regarded by critics as minor works. In the mid-1990s Miller adapted The Crucible for a film version starring Daniel Day-Lewis and Joan Allen.


About the Playwright, continued

Above: Trinity’s 1965 production of The CrucibleRight: Trinity’s 1971 production of The Price

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Miller has secured his reputation as a major figure in American drama. In addition to his Pulitzer Prize in 1949, his awards include the Theatre Guild National Prize, 1944; Antoinette Perry (Tony) Award given for achievement in the theater, 1947 and 1953; Emmy Award given for achievement in television broadcasting, 1967; George Foster Peabody Award, 1981; John F. Kennedy Award for Lifetime Achievement, 1984; Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize, 1999; National Book Foundation lifetime achievement award, 2001; New York City College Alumni Association medal for artistic devotion to New York, 2001; and the Japan Art Association lifetime achievement award, 2001. Miller passed away in Roxbury, Connecticut in 2005, but will forever be a household name in the theater.

Above: Trinity’s 1971 production of The PriceLeft: Trinity’s 1985 production of The Crucible


About the Playwright, continued

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The Characters and Setting

Above: Stephen Berenson as Willy Loman

Willy Loman Traveling salesman, 60s

Biff Loman Willy’s eldest son, 34

Linda Loman Willy’s wife

Happy Loman Willy’s son, 32

Charley Willy’s neighbor and friend

Bernard Charley’s son

Jenny Charley’s secretary

Ben Loman Willy’s older brother

Howard Willy’s younger boss

Stanley A waiter at the restaurant

Woman Willy’s mistress

Letta Woman of interest to Happy and Biff

Miss Forsyth Woman of interest to Happy and Biff

The action of this play takes place in New York in 1949. The principle setting is Willy Loman’s home, though some scenes take place in restaurants, offices, and hotel spaces in New York and Boston.

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Fatima Faris: How important or relevant do you think it is to tell the story of the crumbling American Dream in 2017?Brian McEleney: Well, we’re living in a time of increasing income inequality where we have a relatively well off, sometimes extremely well off, segment of the population, and a whole other huge segment of the population that is not. And the middle seems to be eroding and there seems to be no way to get from one to the other. You know, we’re living in a time where it’s possible for people to work a full time job and still be below the poverty line. We’re living in a time where one health crisis can bankrupt a family. It’s really important to look at what America is doing for all of us. This play, specifically, is about the responsibility we have for each other. It really questions the American myth of self reliance and competition: that we’re all in it for ourselves and getting ahead of the next guy is the goal - as opposed to making it possible for everyone to live and rise together.

FF: Why do so many people cling to the American Dream and why is it so contentious?BM: The term “American Dream” was invented in the 50s, so somewhat after this play was written. This play is absolutely questioning the meaning of the American Dream. According to our Declaration if Independence, we are all entitled to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Somehow the American culture has changed the idea of the American Dream to mean, “we’re all entitled to get rich, and do anything and everything we can to get rich.” That’s a compelling dream—lots of people love it—but the downside of this idea that everything is possible is that we start celebrating and saying the people who “make it” are the winners, and the people who don’t “make it” are the losers. Somehow it’s their fault if they’re not winners. That’s really what this play is about; that in a culture of unfettered competition, if you’re poor, handicapped, or not constantly rising, then you are deficient


A Conversation with Brian McEleney

We’re doing this play because it needs to be done now.

Above: Brian McEleney, Director

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or lazy. Or if you’re not up to snuff, then it’s okay to leave you behind because the country is made by and for the “winners.” And that’s a tough way of looking at the American Dream.

FF: What is the most important thing you want the audience to take away from this production?BM: I think the most important thing for the audience to take away from the show is the same thing you often want them to take away, which is empathy, which is a sense of saying, “this is a human life in front of me, that is glorious and unique and flawed, but worth celebrating—someone to whom attention must be paid,” as Linda Loman says in the play. We’ve got to think of everyone as a hero. Arthur Miller set out to write a tragedy of a common man, a “low” man. This is to say that an ordinary person who isn’t making it, who is flawed, who has a lot of personality problems, is not a perfect or great guy in any way is still worthy of being looked at and celebrated and understood. And the more that we do that, the better off our own lives and our own culture will be.

FF: The final line of the play, Linda is proclaiming to Willy’s grave that they’re free after her last payment on the house. That’s very powerful. If he were alive, do you think that is something that would have fulfilled Willy? BM: It certainly would have relieved him (laughs). A lot of this play is about living beyond your means so you can prove to everybody how great you are. The Lomans get into trouble because they buy everything on credit. When they finally pay for the house, can they say, “enough is enough, let’s be happy with what we have and what we achieved”? Where does happiness come from? Does it come from ownership? Does it come from security? Does it come from just being satisfied with what you have? Yes, to all those things. The play asks these questions and one of the reasons it’s a great play is because it doesn’t answer them. Would Willy have been

fulfilled? Possibly. On some level, Linda is the opposite of Willy. She keeps asking, “why does everybody have to conquer the world? Why does everybody have to be a leader of men? Why can’t we just live and be happy instead of struggling to get ahead of the next guy?

FF: What was your biggest challenge taking on this project? And what do you think its relationship is to Dominique Morisseau’s Skeleton Crew?BM: There are lots of challenges. It’s an iconic play. How do you live up to all the other great productions, the great actors, the great directors? But that’s true of a lot of plays. I think the biggest challenge was doing it in relation to Skeleton Crew and trying to figure out how to really negotiate that relationship set-wise and casting-wise. We think of Death of a Salesman as the great American play, and it is on so many levels. And after a lot of talking with Sarah Brown, the designer, I kind of said to myself, “What if we think of Skeleton Crew as the essential play; the play that’s about now; the play that is about the lives of people we see and recognize,” and that we’ll doing Death of a Salesman to ask how we got here. What has led to this culture in which corporations have no responsibility to their workers? That was a big revelation to me. Death of a Salesman is a response to Skeleton Crew and not the other way around. We’re doing Death of a Salesman on the set of Skeleton Crew. And that’s just a different way of thinking about what we’re doing, how we’re doing it, and why we’re doing it. We’re doing this play because it needs to be done now. We need to give Skeleton Crew context and depth, rather than the other way around.


A Conversation with Brian McEleney

This play is absolutely questioning the meaning of the American dream.

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The play was written in 1949 and was meant to be performed as a modern piece in that day and age. 1949 and the subsequent decade were a very different time. Here are a few things that happened in or around that year:

World War II ended in 1945 and the United States—and the world—was still recovering. Over 415,000 Americans were killed during the war.


World of the Play

Harry Truman was president at the time and gave the “Fair Deal” speech, in which he expressed his belief that every American should expect a fair deal from the U.S. government. This deal stated that every worker should have health insurance and recommended minimum wage for workers be increased.

The first polaroid camera sold for $89.95. This is really expensive given the prices of food at the time. One could go to a diner and eat a hamburger, slice of pie, and coffee for $0.40 altogether.

The first year of the Emmy Awards was televised. This award show (which is ongoing) praised and gifted trophies to those who were famous in television.

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is founded in order to ensure the safety of member European and North American countries.

Soviet Union tests the first atomic bomb (increased tensions of the Cold War between the USSR and the United States). Many feared that there would be another war because of the heightened tensions between the democratic and communist global powers.

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THE AMERICAN DReam

The American Dream is the idealistic view that with hard work, determination, and initiative, one will live a successful and prosperous life. When one thinks of the American Dream in the1950s, one usually thinks of a white picket fence, successful patriarch, homemaker wife, and well to do children. This ideal is revisited throughout the play by protagonist Willy Loman, as he strives to maintain the illusion of being an affluent salesman with sons that, by his account, should be prosperous. Though everyone in Willy’s life knows this is not their reality, the strive for this “American Dream” is what drives Willy, and ultimately leads to his demise.

Discussion Questions: How does Willy’s perception of the American Dream differ from his sons’ and his neighbor, Charley? How does Willy’s belief system control his actions? Is Willy’s idea of the American Dream the same or different than the ideal life of the typical American in 2017?

NOSTALGIA AND TRADITION

Willy frequently talks and reminisces about old times and his glory days. He believed that he would have been a more successful salesperson in New York had his boss’s father not died. He also believes that his son, Biff, would be a much more successful and grounded person had he gone to summer school and passed math. Willy’s stronghold of the past stifles his growth and ability to adapt to the changing world.

Discussion Questions: How has Willy’s grasp of the past has negatively affected his familial and work life in the present?

FAMILY Willy’s choices are directly related to how his actions will affect his family. In his mind, he is doing everything he can to make sure his family is secure. There are, however, still tensions that exist in his family, mainly between him and his eldest son. Arthur Miller includes the characters of Charley and his son Bernard to juxtapose their relationship to that of Willy and his sons. Because of their very different upbringings, the respective children ended up with very different lives.

Discussion Questions: How is the Loman family dynamic different from Charley and Bernard’s? How is Linda’s perception of what makes a happy home different from her sons’ and husband’s?

ILLUSION VS REALITY

The play travels in and out of Willy’s experiences in the past, conversations with his deceased older brother, and actual events in current time. Willy’s inability to differentiate what is real and what is not negatively affects his relationship with his family and others in his life. The audience learns more about why the Lomans are the way that they are through Willy’s periods of reminiscing and illusions.

Discussion Questions: What do you perceive to be Willy’s biggest regret in life? What do you think his illusions about those regrets?


Major Themes

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The American Dream is defined as the expectation that success and prosperity will be the outcome of hard

work, determination, and initiative. Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman and Dominique Morisseau’s Skeleton Crew are prime examples of Americans navigating what the American Dream means to them, and whether or not it can be obtained.

Although told decades apart, the themes in Death of a Salesman are echoed in Skeleton Crew. While both deal with blue collar life, loyalty, and generational differences, the overarching theme is the American Dream. There is a myriad ways to look at what the American Dream means and how one can achieve it. In order to best grasp the significance of this, we must first look at the quality of life and standard of living in these two time periods.

Death of a Salesman takes place a few years after World War II in busy New York City. On the flip side, Skeleton Crew takes place in Detroit, MI in 2008. Both NYC and Detroit are bustling urban areas with a diverse population. Additionally, the country was going through financial strife in both time periods. The Great Depression ended in 1939, but the country almost immediately joined the war, which ended in 1949. Everyone was still getting back to the way things were, and trying to adjust to the new changes. In 2008, the United States went into the biggest recession since the Great Depression in October of that year. Detroit, a city known for the auto industry (which needed major bailouts from the government), was one of the hardest hit cities in the country.

Below are the differences we find in standard life between the two cities*: Year New House New Car Loaf of

BreadMinimum Wage

1949 $7,450 $1,420 $0.12 $0.70

2008 $238,880 $27,958 $2.79 $7.40

*The inflation rate over these years was 3.74%, meaning $1.00 in 2008 had the same buying power as $8.72 in 2008. When viewing this chart, it is very easy for one to assume that living in 1949 was an easier life because things were seemingly cheaper. However, one must also remember that the value of the dollar has changed over those 60 years. Willy in Death of a Salesman complains a lot about household expenses, as he does not actually make a salary. On the other end, Faye makes a salary, but not enough to pay her mortgage, which puts her out of a home. In both plays, the essential characters struggle with financial instability and finding a means to an end—not only for themselves, but for others in their lives. To Willy, the American Dream means being able to provide for his family, having successful sons, and being a well-liked, respected salesman. When confronted with the idea that this “dream” may not be fulfilled, it shakes Willy to his core to the point of being suicidal. On the other hand, the American Dream to Faye is being able to get by and collecting the retirement package, which represents her loyalty to the company that she helped build, and in turn, built her. When she is faced with the daunting reality that she cannot have her dream fulfilled, she insists on protecting those around her, while still taking what she thinks she deserves.


The American Dream, Then and Now

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Willy Loman – an aging and tired salesman – returns to his wife Linda in their Brooklyn home after an unsuccessful attempt to

complete his drive to New England, which is his territory. Willy clings to delusions and memories, while Linda supports him and tries to make ends meet from his meager commissions. She worries every day about the suicide attempts that he’s made. She tells him to ask his boss to move him to New York so he does not have to make so many dangerous trips.

His son Biff’s arrival brings conflicting emotions: disappointment at his son’s failure to “find himself” and hope that the one-time football hero will find success. Biff and his brother Happy are concerned with their father and his erratic actions. Willy has crashed his car several times and has long conversations with his long-deceased brother, Ben. Linda remains devoted to her husband and chastises her boys for not recognizing the worth of their father. After 36 years with the company, Willy has had his salary taken away as his ability to sell pales in comparison to what he accomplished decades earlier when he opened up entire new territories for the company.

Biff tries to make his father proud by seeking out funding from an old boss so that he can make his own business with Happy. Biff and Happy plan a dinner with Willy to celebrate what they think will be a great day, but the dinner ends in disaster. Earlier that day, Willy meets with his boss, Howard, trying to convince him to stay and sell in New York. Instead, Willy is fired. Willy still holds out hope for his sons’ success. However, not only has Biff not even been able to get a meeting with his contact, the boys abandon Willy at the restaurant and depart with women they’ve just met.

So many things haven’t gone right for Willy over his life. He constantly reminisces about how he passed up the chance to follow his brother Ben to Africa, where Ben made his fortune. Through his delusions and memories, Willy remembers how Biff’s adoration for him was upended when he showed up unexpectedly at Willy’s Boston hotel room and made a discovery that destroyed Biff’s faith in him. Their relationship was never the same after that.

Willy returns home humiliated after the failed dinner and Linda, furious, tells their sons to get out of their father’s life. Biff and Willy have one final fight that leaves Willy touched with his son’s love for him. The best way to provide for his success, Willy finally determines, is the life insurance policy he’s been dutifully making payments on for years.

Willy Loman’s tragedy is complete and his funeral largely ignored. In Linda’s tearful goodbye she tells Willy that the last payment was made on their house that day – they’re finally free.


A Summary of Death of a Salesman

Above: Trinity Rep’s 1978 production of Death of a Salesman

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Exercise One: TWO TRUTHS AND A LIE

The lines in Death of a Salesman are somewhat blurred when it comes to what is true and what isn’t. Even those telling the tales sometime cannot tell the difference! With your class, have each person come up with three statements about their lives. Two should be true, one should not. Each person should state their three personal “facts” aloud and have the class try to deduce which one is not true.

Discussion Questions: How were you able to tell when someone was lying? How did you try to hide your lie when it was your turn to share?

You will need: a table, six chairs and a bottle.Participants are asked to arrange the objects so as to make one chair become the most powerful object, in relation to the other chairs, the table and the bottle. The group will run through a great number of variations in the arrangement. Then, when a suitable arrangement has been reached, an arrangement which the group feels is the most power.

Discussion Questions: Where do you (the students) think you belong in the power structure? In which aspects of your life do you have the most power? When are you most powerless?

Have the class split into pairs and label each one as A or B. Have A interview B about something that happened in their life. Then A will retell that story as a salesperson and soldier. Have B do the same for A performing as a lawyer and a CEO.

Discussion Questions: What aspects from the story do each of these characters pull out? How does the story change depending on who is telling it? How does your understanding of the the original storyteller change depending on who is retelling it? Which version of the story are you most drawn to? How does this relate to Death of a Salesman? How does this affect our understanding of stories and how they are compiled or created?

Much of this play flows between memories from Willy’s past and the present day.1. Choose a vivid memory that you have from your past It can be either a recent memory or something from long ago. The memory should only be a single moment. Form a clear picture in your head and draw the visual representation of your memory. Your drawing does not have to exactly match the way you physically saw the memory; you may change it however you want.2. Share your drawing with a small group. Explain to them how you remember this particular moment: what you were feeling or thinking at the time.3. Pick one drawing and create a frozen, physical picture together of that particular person’s memory. Make sure that your group picture clearly depicts the emotion associated with the memory. Ask the audience which emotion they thought the picture represented.

Discussion Questions: What do these drawn memories tell us about our points of view and how we remember things in our past? How likely is it that others who experienced the same memory would have the same exact depiction?

Exercise Two: THE GREAT GAME OF POWER

Exercise Three: WHO TELLS YOUR STORY?

Exercise Four:COMPELLING MEMORIES


Exercises 1 - 4

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Exercise Five: YOUR DREAM, MY DREAM

You will need: a slip of paper and writing utensils for each student.One of the major themes in Death of a Salesman is the concept of the American Dream. Have each student write what they think the ideal lifestyle is to succeed in America. Then, collect all of the slips of paper and hand them out to the students, No one should have their own slip of paper. Use the discussion vquestions ot compare each other’s “dreams.”

Discussion Questions: How do the students’ idea of the perfect life differ across the board? What does this say about the different paths we choose to take in life? Have the class relate this back to Death of a Salesman and how each of the character’s goals in life differ—and what tensions do these cause?

Exercise Six: THIS IS US

You will need: a hat or bowl and a few sheets of paper.Write out the following relationships on a slip of paper:• Parent and Child• Spouses• Siblings• Neighbors• Old Friends• Boss and EmployeePut all of these “relationships” in a bowl or hat and ask students to pick them out. After the students have chosen, have them create tableaux (frozen pictures) of what they think these relationships look like. The rest of the class will try to guess what the characters are.

Discussion Questions: What do these tableaux tell us about the power structures in these relationships? Would an outsider be able to tell what the relationships are between the characters by the tableaux?

Exercise Seven: HASHTAG FINSTA

Willy’s public persona is deeply rooted in validation from others. That persona is different when around his family. What would the Lomans be like if they were around today? What would Willy, Linda, Biff, and Happy’s Instagram and Facebook pages look like? Conversely, what would their “finsta” (fake Instagram page for close friends) look like?

Discussion Questions: How would the idea of the perfect life translate to social media in present day? Where does the line of being well liked by strangers meet with the relationships of people you actually know on social media?


Exercises 5 - 7

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BIFF: You know why I had no address for three months? I stole a suit in Kansas City and I was jailed. I stole myself out of every good job since high school. And I never got anywhere because you blew me so full of hot air I could never stand taking orders from anybody! That’s whose fault it is! It’s goddamn time you heard that! I had to be boss big shot in two weeks, and I’m through with it! Willy! I ran down eleven flights with a pen in my hand today. And suddenly I stopped, you hear me? And in the middle of that office building, do you hear this? I stopped in the middle of that building and I saw - the sky. I saw the things that I love in the world. The work and the food and the time to sit and smoke. And I looked at the pen and said to myself, what the hell am I grabbing this for? Why am I trying to become what I don’t want to be? What am I doing in an office, making a contemptuous, begging fool of myself, when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say I know who I am! Why can’t I say that, Willy? Pop! I’m a dime a dozen, and so are you! I am not a leader of men, Willy, and neither are you. You were never anything but a hard-working drummer who landed in the ash-can like all the rest of them! I’m one dollar an hour, Willy! I tried seven states and couldn’t raise it! A buck an hour! Do you gather my meaning? I’m not bringing home any prizes any more, and you’re going to stop waiting for me to bring them home! Pop, I’m nothing! I’m nothing, Pop. Can’t you understand that? There’s no spite in it any more. I’m just what I am, that’s all. Will you let me go, for Christ’s sake? Will you take that phony dream and burn it before something happens?

Exercise Nine: ReaD alouD-MONOLOGUES


Exercises 8 - 9

Exercise Eight: FISHBOWL DISCUSSION

Create an inner and outer circle. Use the following questions to ask the inner circle. While the inner circle discusses the questions asked (popcorn style), the outer circle will quietly listen to the discussion. After fifteen minutes, students in the inner circle will switch with those in the outer circle. You may ask the same or different questions to this new group.

Discussion Questions:1. What are the positive and negative effects of capitalism?2. What does this play tell us about how hard it is to embrace or oppose change?3. We are taught that always doing the right thing and following a certain path will lead to success. Death of a Salesman shows that is not always the case. How do we learn to accept that a lot of the time following one path does not yield our desired results?4. How has the expectations of what makes a successful person changed over generations? Take into account your (students’) parents’ and grandparents’ growth from when they were young to where they are now.5. How do our relationships with those in our lives affect how we act when we are not around those people and what we push ourselves to do?6. Willy is very much an antihero—meaning a protagonist that we do not always agree with. What advice would you give to Willy if he were here?

Give students these monologues to read from the play. What do these monologues tell you about the characters?

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Exercise Nine: ReaD alouD-MONOLOGUES

LINDA: Are they any worse than his sons? When he brought them business, when he was young, they were glad to see him. But now his old friends, the old buyers that loved him so and always found some order to hand him in a pinch — they’re all dead, retired. He used to be able to make six, seven calls a day in Boston. Now he takes his valises out of the car and puts them back and takes them out again and he’s exhausted. In- stead of walking he talks now. He drives seven hundred miles, and when he gets there no one knows him anymore, no one welcomes him. And what goes through a man’s mind, driving seven hundred miles home without having earned a cent? Why shouldn’t’t he talk to himself? Why? When he has to go to Charley and borrow fifty dollars a week and pretend to me that it’s his pay? How long can that go on? How long? You see what I’m sitting here and waiting for? And you tell me he has no character? The man who never worked a day but for your benefit? When does he get the medal for that? Is this his reward — to turn around at the age of sixty-three and find his sons, who he loved better than his life, one a philandering bum. That’s all you are, my baby! (To Biff.) And you! What happened to the love you had for him? You were such pals! How you used to talk to him on the phone every night! How lonely he was till he could come home to you!

WILLY: Business is definitely business, but just listen for a minute. You don’t understand this. When I was a boy — eighteen, nineteen — I was already on the road. And there was a question in my mind as to whether selling had a future for me. Because in those days I had a yearning to go to Alaska. See, there were three gold strikes in one month in Alaska, and I felt like going out. Just for the ride, you might say. Oh, yeah, my father lived many years in Alaska. He was an adventurous man. We’ve got quite a little streak of self- reliance in our family. I thought I’d go out with my older brother and try to locate him, and maybe settle in the North with the old man. And I was almost decided to go, when I met a salesman in the Parker House. His name was Dave Singleman. And he was eighty-four years old, and he’d drummed merchandise in thirty-one states. And old Dave, he’d go up to his room, y’understand, put on his green velvet slippers — I’ll never forget — and pick up his phone and call the buyers, and without ever leaving his room, at the age of eighty-four, he made his living. And when I saw that, 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, and pick up a phone, and be remembered and loved and helped by so many different people? Do you know? When he died — and by the way he died the death of a salesman, in his green velvet slippers in the smoker of the New York, New Haven and Hartford, going into Boston — when he died, hundreds of salesmen and buyers were at his funeral. Things were sad on a lotta trains for months after that. (He stands up. Howard has not looked at him.) In those days there was personality in it, Howard. There was respect, and comradeship, and gratitude in it. Today, it’s all cut and dried, and there’s no chance for bringing friendship to bear — or personality. You see what I mean? They don’t know me anymore.


Exercise 9

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Bibliography

Works Cited

Pearson, The. “What Happened In 1949 Including Pop Culture, Significant Events, Key Technology And Inventions.” Thepeoplehistory.com. Web. 11 Sept. 2017.

“Calculate The Value Of $1 In 1940.” Dollartimes.com. Web. 11 Sept. 2017.

Pearson, The. “The Changing Prices Of Stuff In 80 Years Comparison Of Prices Over The Last 80Yrs.” Thepeoplehistory.com. Web. 11 Sept. 2017.

“Michigan’s Minimum Wage Set To Increase July 1, 2008 | Labor & Employment Attorneys In Michigan: Foster Swift.” Fosterswift.com. Web. 11 Sept. 2017.

“Prices Of Diner Food In 1949: Off Topic Forum: Digital Photography Review.” Dpreview.com. Web. 11 Sept. 2017.

“Arthur Miller Biography - Life, Children, Name, Story, Death, History, Wife, School, Mother, Book.” Notablebiographies.com. Web. 11 Sept. 2017.

“Research Starters: Worldwide Deaths In World War II | The National WWII Museum | New Orleans.” The National WWII Museum | New Orleans. Web. 11 Sept. 2017.

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