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The Tragic Hero and Identity Crisis

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Part One

The Tragic Hero

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What is a Tragic Hero

They usually face a serious decision.

They might not deserve to have the

downfall but they are punished anyway.

They discover that their downfall is caused by his

own actions and not what happens to him.

They usually make an error which causes

their downfall.

A tragic hero is usually the main

character in a tragedy.

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Quotations

Willy: “Ben, am I right? Don’t you think I’m right? I value your advice.”One of Willy’s main mistakes was that he trusted the advice of a person in his head and Ben might not even exist. It was due to this action that he made the bad mistake of trying to be a business man and encouraging his sons to be businessmen too.

“Lick the world! You guys could absolutely lick the world.”He gives his sons false impressions that they are perfect and that as long they want to do it, they can do anything. However this is not true and Biff and Happy are not suitable businessmen so this leads to Willy’s disappointment and ultimately his downfall.

“You got a greatness in you, Biff, remember that.”Willy almost lives vicariously through Biff and puts all of his hopes and dreams that he cannot accomplish himself and forces Biff to take on the job. This puts too much pressure on Biff and when Biff discovers that Willy is not the man that he portrays, he feels betrayed and gives up all hope.

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ScenesWilly had to make a decision between swallowing his pride and accepting Charley’s job or keep borrowing money from Charley and lying to his family.

Willy makes the mistake of asking for a New York job. He wanted a better job but ended up getting fired. He could have stayed on working for commission. He convinced himself that since he named Howard then Howard would give him the job.

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Tragic Hero in Characters

Willy believes that his dream is right and that the Loman family are good

businessmen and they are supposed to be rich.

Willy didn’t purposely cause his son, Biff to give up on his life.

Both Linda and Willy did not mean to mislead their sons by telling them that they were perfect and that they were

gods.

Willy didn’t deserve to get fired or any of the unfortunates that

happened to him just for having the wrong dreams.

Even though Willy only wanted to give his sons the best, he doesn’t realize that by telling his sons that they are like Adonis doesn’t help them in anyway. His sons won’t know how to improve.

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Links to Today’s Society

Modern day shoppers usually have less time to converse

with the salesman so they go to supermarkets where they

can just pick up and go.

Although not purposely, Willy chose the wrong job for people in modern

day.

If he chose something that many people would need now instead of a job that

people don’t need anymore he would have less chance

of being fired.

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Audience’s Response

The audience should get a better understanding of the mistakes that Willy made and if he had made a different decision then the ending of his story would have been completely different.

Audience should have sympathized with Willy instead of think of him as

stupid because it is easy for them to relate to him.

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Playwright’s Message

I think that the Arthur Miller is trying to tell us that life isn’t fair and that sometimes no

matter how hard you work your just not suited for that kind of career or lifestyle.

It is shown through the main character Willy Loman who has worked all his life for a

company and gets no thanks at all in his old age. No matter how hard Willy works he

doesn’t get any award or pay back and he relies on lies and hopeless dreams to get him

through the day.

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Part 2

Identity Crisis

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What is Identity Crisis

People are unsure of their role in life.

Erik Erikson discovered “Identity

Crisis.”

He believed that identity crisis is one of the most

critical conflict that humans encounter

through the 8 developments in life.

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Quotations

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Scenes

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Identity Crisis in Characters

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Links to Society

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Links to Today

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Audience’s Response

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Playwright’sMessage

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Bibliography

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragic_hero• http://www.spiritus-temporis.com/identity-crisis-psychology-/