There’s a scene in Arthur Miller’s “Death of a Salesman” in which Willy Lowman is in his boss’s office for the last time, and, if I remember correctly, he is begging his boss not to let him go, to give him another chance. And while Willy is pleading with him, his boss takes out a tape recorder and begins listening to the playback of a recording of his young son’s voice as he recites the 50 states and their capitols. One man and his career are being destroyed, literally killed, and the other is completely indifferent to his suffering. It is the ultimate contrast: desperation and ambivalence, youth and old age, health and sickness, something to live for and nothing to live for. It is surreal and it is the most terrifying scene I have ever read.
I found it so disturbing because at that particular time it was the affirmation of the belief I had formed after watching the destruction of my father’s 18 year career–that nobody cared and that no one could help us. And they couldn’t. That’s part of what was so powerful about “Death of a Salesman” for me; it showed that, because we are alone in our fight to survive and make money, when it really comes down to it, all of our professional and many of our personal relationships are fake.
That’s art–when the words in a book are the catalyst for the boiling over of the churning caldron of the human heart. That’s genius.
Arthur Miller died last week, and you should read and see his plays. Of course, in the two years since reading “Death of a Salesman,” I’ve matured and grown and come to realize that the world is not the moral tundra I had come to believe it was, and my dad’s situation has improved dramatically.
I think “Death of a Salesman” had such a profound impact on me because it was the last stop on the road out of adolescence (mine lasted beyond 18) and immaturity for me. As part of my becoming an adult, I had to grow and understand that men have to make bitter, bitter compromises and that many times in life, despite your best efforts, you lose.
Now I read “Death of a Salesman” differently; I see the characters with different eyes and I draw new meanings and conclusions from Miller’s work. And that’s a tribute to Miller’s chops; as I become more complex, so does his play.