Death of a Salesman

Death of a Salesman

1. Themes

   • Death in life (Anderson)
   • moral responsibility
   • social forces
   • alienation

2. Movement

   • Realist
   • Naturalist
   • expressionistic

3. Devices

   • foreshadowings (Ibsen)
   • anachonies
   • vernacular speech
   • self-delusion
   • analepsis
   • Hamartia
   • contradictions
   • advertising
   • anagnorisis
   • linguistic realism (speech style
   • dramatic irony

4. memory play

5. Motifs

   • threat on the common and ordinary
   • common man as dramatic hero (Everyman)
   • Reversal of myth of A family
   • birthright to prosper
   • Darwinian implications
   • myth of the open road undermined