The "Death of a Salesman" chronicles the life of Willy Loman, a traveling salesman, who works at a dead end job in order to support his family. He is 60 years old and has not seen the fulfillment of any of the dreams he's had for himself and his family. Instead, he lives in a small apartment with his wife and sons, who watch Willy work to the bone unrewarded. The story of Willy Loman illustrates what happens when the American dream dies and how denial on the part of the dreamer leads to internal and external suffering.

Because Willy has not fulfilled his dreams, he takes out his frustration on his family. By virtue of her proximity, his wife Linda sees the devastating affects of working at a worthless job. Although she loves and admires him, she deals with the temper that results from his frustration. She sees his actions "as sharp reminders of the turbulent longings within him, longings which she shares but lacks the temperament to utter and follow to their end" (12). Instead of telling him that his dreams will never be fulfilled, she, in a way, feeds his delusions of greatness. Thus, Willy's see his own lack of fulfillment in his two sons.

Happy and Biff are in their early 30s and neither of them seem to have their lives together. Willy sees himself in his boys, the death of the American dream by the way they are living. This attitude has rubbed off on them as well. Happy drowns himself in the company of women; Biff traipses across the country from one job to another. Biff says of himself, "I've always made a point of not wasting my life, and everytime I come back here I know that all I've done is to waste my life" (23) He sees himself as a failure and headed down the same road as his father. Yet, Willy remains in denial, even thought this is hurting himself and his family.

Willy thinks about all of the missed opportunities he has had in his life. He could have moved to places where he would have made more money. Yet, he stays were he is and makes excuses or blames others for his failure and denies his part in his unfulfilled American dream. Because he is sick of the life he's wasted, he is constantly trying to kill himself. Yet, his family denies that he is trying to commit suicide for a long time. They finally start adding the attempted accidents up and realize that is actions are part of the anguish of not achieving his dreams.

While he is attempting to kill himself, Willy still puts up a faade for his family and friends. He doesn't want them

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