Death Of Salesman Realism Essays - English-language Films

Death Of Salesman Realism Realism can be defined as an attempt to reproduce the surface appearance of the life of normal people in everyday situations (Kennedy 1410). Basically realism is a situation that normal people can relate to based on their own experiences. Realism is extremely prevalent in the play Death of a Salesman. The characters in the play all have real world problems. Lack of money is one of the problems, which is a problem for many people. There are also many conflicts within the family; the biggest is over what success is; money and power or happiness. Willy Loman also wants his children to have a better than he has and tries to do everything he can so they will have a better life, including ending his own. One realistic situation that many people can relate to is money problems. Money is one of the main problems that Willy Loman had throughout the play. The Loman family had many purchases on payments. Linda even states "for the vacuum cleaner there's three and a half due on the fifteenth" (Miller 1650). The Loman family was living from week to week. Every time Willy came home from a fairly successful day selling, he would think he was finally getting ahead. Willy would tell Linda how much he had made, but she would then point out how much they owed on everything. Willy then felt overwhelmed and said "My God, if business don't pick up I don't know what I'm gonna do!" (1650). Linda would then reassure Willy and tell him "Well, next week you'll do better" (1650). Many people in real life have this same problem. Every time they feel they are getting ahead financially, a problem occurs and they find themselves right back where they started. Most people also have to deal with problems and conflicts within their family throughout their life. Family problems were not exempt from the characters in Death of a Salesman. Biff's idea of success was completely opposite from Willy's. Willy viewed success as achieving money and power; Biff however viewed success in life as being happy. Biff realized that "I'm just what I am, that's all" (1703). Biff realized he was "a dime a dozen" (1703), but his father could not accept this reality. This situation where parents always keep telling their children what else they could be is common in many families. In actuality the children are where they want to be in life, but the parents just cannot accept their children's contentment. Biff spent most of his life trying to please Willy, but Biff finally realized that he never could. He was what he was. The most realistic part of the play may have been about how much Willy loved his children and how he wanted their life to be better than his own. Willy raised his children the best he could. The character Ben even seemed to appear when Willy was trying to make a decision on how to make the boys lives better. This situation with Ben makes it appear that Willy has such a hard time making a decision about what is best for the boys, that he relies on his imagination for an answer. The main reason Willy ends up killing himself is because he thinks it will help Biff start his own business with the life insurance money. Willy did everything with the best of intentions and thought his actions and decisions would benefit his children. Most parents are the same way and will do anything in their power to help their children. When reading Death of a Salesman, most people can relate to the problems of the Loman's. The similarities of the Loman's problems to the everyday problems that average people face make this a play full of realism. Bibliography Kennedy, X.J., and Dana Gioia. Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. New York: Addison Wesley Longman, Inc., 1999. 1410 Miller, Arthur. Death of a Salesman. Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. Seventh Edition. X.J. Kennedy, and Dana Gioia. New York: Addison Wesley Longman, Inc., 1999.

When The Legends Die Essays - Ute People, Man Of The Family

When The Legends Die Essays - Ute People, Man Of The Family When The Legends Die This is the story of the life an Ute family, and in particular the way of their people. The story starts off with the father of the family, George Black Bull running for his life from the sheriff and Blue Elk, one of the old Ute men. He had shot a man named Frank No Deer, he had killed him for stealing his money three times that he owed to a sawmill in Pagosa where he had worked with many other of his people, that he had saved for a long period of time. So George, his wife Bessie and son decided to live in the mountains, where they would live the old way, singing songs for different occasions, fishing and hunting with arrow instead of guns, and making use of the wilderness and all of it's resources. They built a cabin to live in, in a location where George would not be found and put in jail for his crime, they caught their meals, sewed their clothes and lived life and taught their son the way it had been lived by many generations of their people in the past, until one da! y George was crushed by an avalanche while hunting in a valley. Bessie new now that their son had become the man of the family, and would be responsible for many of the tasks that needed to be done in order to survive, it was also time for him to pick a name, he chose the name Bear's Brother. Every once and a while they went to the village to trade for items that they could not make, but after a short period of time Bessie became very ill and died. Bear's Brother had learned the ways and was now capable of taking care of himself, he continued to live life the old way. One day he journeyed to town to trade items, he told what had happened to his parents and that he was living alone with a bear, but Blue Elk thought that he should not be living this way and that he should be in school and living the way of the present. Blue Elk followed Bear's Brother to his cabin and they talked for many hours, Bear's Brother re-taught Blue Elk the old ways and talked with Bear's Brother f! or many hours, and finally convinced him to come to town with him and remind his people of these old ways. I personally like the setting of the wilderness in this book. I enjoy reading and learning the ways that native people lived their lives in the wilderness even if it is fiction and not fact. The setting is very detailed, believable and has enough but not too much description. "She cried out once in horror, and the boy heard and came and stood beside her, watching, as the snow plume floated all the way down the slope and the thunder of the slide echoed into the silence," is a phrase that I found particularly enjoyable and descriptive. I like the way that the author has not introduced too many characters at once and has limited the number of characters that are of relevance during certain periods of the book. I find it is very annoying when a book has many important characters all at one point or section of the book, instead Hal Borland introduces characters at various stages of the book, and now that Bear's Brother's parents have died I'm sure a few more characters will be introduced. I like Blue Elks character because he's mysterious and seems to show up every once and a while in the book, he seems to be everyone's friend. For example, when Bear's Brother's bear is attacking dogs in the village, he shows up for no apparent reason. There's not too much suspense in this book, but I think it's mainly because there's no need for suspense in this style of book. A not so obvious example of foreshadowing would be right after George fights Frank No Deer for stealing his money. After he has fought he checks his pocket to see if his money is still there, and of course it's gone. The author wouldn't have