... for success affects his family, his friends, and most importantly himself. Many factors can contribute to an individual's success. Ben, Willy's deceased older brother has a major impact on Willy's drive for success. Ben is a shadowy figure who functions more as a symbol or illusion than he does as a character. What we ... fair with a stranger. He seems to have no time for personal relations, nor does he seem to indulge in the emotions. For Willy, Ben represents the ideal success story. Ben stated " when I was seventeen I walked into the jungle, and when I was twenty-one I walked out And ...

• Word Count: 1216
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

... Biff is lost in the world with no light, until the end, to find his vision of the "American Dream."" Miller also adds in Willy's brother Ben whose life is not as much someone's definition of a working success as it is almost anyone's dream of success. A less noticeable character in the play ... . Ashamed to be stuck in Brooklyn with a low-paying job, Willy yearns for his brother Ben's happy-go-lucky lifestyle. Ben represents more of a dream of success rather than an ideology. In the play it says Ben went looking for their father in Alaska but made it to Africa and in the jungle he ... o...

• Word Count: 1159
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

... always wanted him to be. On the other side of Willy's argument is his brother Ben. Ben is described as someone who is true to his self, not corrupted by materialism. Instead Ben is successful in his own way. Willy describes Ben by saying that all he has to do is go into any city, pick up ... the phone and he's making his living. Miller uses Ben's reference to the "jungle" as the setting to show how Ben's ruthless success carries uneasy connotations of a place where only the fittest will survive and in which weaker members like Willy will ... understand the significance of this situation...

• Word Count: 1734
• Approx Pages: 7
• Grade Level: High School

... the characters Biff and Bernard, so the audience could see that Biff didn't stand anywhere in life. Arthur Miller uses many symbols throughout the play. Willy's brother Ben is a symbol. Ben is Willy's dead brother who shows up to Willy during his flashbacks, in times of trouble. Ben was a rich man who got rich in the diamond mines of Africa. In the play ... Ben is dressed in all white representing wealth and success. The jungle, where Ben found the diamonds is a symbol of competition in the business world, and the diamonds are a symbol of success ... found in the furnace. The hose, whi...

• Word Count: 1156
• Approx Pages: 5
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: High School

... down, a sure sign that he is no longer mentally stable. This impression of the leading character is strengthened by the first appearance of his dead brother, Ben. In this scene, as he sits playing cards with Charley, Willy is unable to distinguish between real and imaginary. He converses with both men in the ... his long dead brother and his very real friend. The way in which Willy interprets what Ben is saying now begins to give the audience some idea of his delusions; it is obvious to most that Ben never answers his brothers questions but Willy hears only what fits in with his preconc...

• Word Count: 1911
• Approx Pages: 8
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

... kitchen playing cards with his only friend in the world and former neighbor Charley. It is at this time that Willy receives a flashback of his brother Ben before he went off and suddenly became rich in Africa. Willy believes that he is sitting in his kitchen with the whole family his brother ... Ben, Biff and Happy, along with Linda. He gets Ben to tell the story of his successful trek and business trip to Alaska but instead of going up he was heading due south and ... dreaming of. He thinks that by telling his kids that his brother struck it rich in Africa by hardly doing a thing, just...

• Word Count: 1289
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

... the conflict between Willy and Biff in their own "secondary" roles by providing insight with their often brief and rare dialogue. For example: Ben exemplifies Willy's desires in his afterlife through Willy's complete admiration of his success and confidence. "Ben! That man was a genius, that man was success incarnate!" Charley, a minor character who helped Willy through his struggles addressed Willy's obsession with ... just as the name Oedipus is suggestive that he will always drag his past behind him. The family curse aspect can be seen in Ben and Happy. Willy wants to become everythi...

• Word Count: 1550
• Approx Pages: 6
• Grade Level: High School

... Willy receives bad news he always fantasizes about a brother that he never really knew. Willy remembers his brother Ben leaving when Willy was little, but he thinks that Ben came home extremely rich. While playing cards with Charley he has a fantasy of when Ben came to see Willy and told him about how he went to Africa and came out of the jungles ... brother's job offer to work in Alaska. After Willy gets fired from his sales job in Act II, he has a fantasy about when Ben came to him and asked if he was interested in working in a forest that Ben had acquired in Alaska, but Linda convinc...

• Word Count: 680
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: High School

... . After Willy's daydream ends, Charley comes in to play cards with him. While they are playing cards Charley offers Willy a job, but Willy refuses. As they are talking, Willy's brother, Ben, appears to him in an illusion. Willy tries to talk to both of them at once and Charley can't understand. Willy and Charley get into an argument and Charley leaves ... . Willy then turns his attention to Ben and asks him how he became so successful. Ben tells Willy that he went into the jungle when he was seventeen and when he came out at twenty-one he was rich. After Biff overhears ... ...

• Word Count: 2162
• Approx Pages: 9
• Grade Level: High School

... insists that he talk to Willy, but Linda refuses to let him. She blames herself for Willy's failures. This is noticeable in Act II with a flashback Willy has. You see Ben, Willy's brother, enter and Willy asks him if he secured the Alaska deal. The younger version of Linda then enters and she tells ... Ben that Willy has a beautiful job in New York. She tells him not to go to Alaska. She wonders why everybody must conquer the world, and tells Willy that he's well- ... insanity gradually increases, Linda is forced to come to terms with what she helped create, which is evident when she t...

• Word Count: 753
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: High School

... 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. 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 ... ...

• Word Count: 1185
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

... he is fine and doesn't need the money, but Charlie knows he does and gives it to him unwillingly. One of Willy's recurring flashbacks is that of his dead brother, Ben. He had been a very successful man by investing / discovering diamond mines in Africa and Willy is mesmerized by tales of "striking it rich ... ". Ben offered Willy a chance to come with him. However, Willy refused due to the fact that he felt he could be as successful. Therefore he stayed in the states to start a ... ...

• Word Count: 1550
• Approx Pages: 6
• Grade Level: High School

... his life. Past actions have changed the present drastically. Willy recalls that in the past there was a future as he asks his older Brother Ben, "How do we get back to all the great times?" Willy regards Ben as a man that knew what he wanted, went out and got it. This only adds to Willy's illusion to get ahead in the business ... ...

• Word Count: 1576
• Approx Pages: 6
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: High School

... ," his son contributes to Willy's suicide by not conforming to what he sees as the perfect son (Miller1880). His brother Ben's success in the jungles of Africa upsets Willy and his feeling of worthlessness increases after he chooses not to accompany Ben. More than just Willy's family is to blame for his destiny. Willy's friends, neighbors, and employer all share some responsibility ... ...

• Word Count: 829
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: High School

... , he feels that the carburetor should not have gone bad and he does not want to pay for it. Willy is delusional as well. He imagines his dead brother Ben a lot. Ben pops in occasionally and tells Willy how great Alaska is and is always how successful he has been. This again fires Willy's desire to succeed and not fail. As was ... ...

• Word Count: 1159
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

... now has to grieve with their loss and Willy was left making yet another bad decision. Willy lives in a life of memories of when he talks to his dead brother Ben who was rich and successful in the diamond industry. Willy is offered a job by Charles and refuses because of pride. He is blinded by the fact that he still believes ... ...

• Word Count: 909
• Approx Pages: 4
• Has Bibliography
• Grade Level: High School

... pollution and high rise apartments add to Willy's dismal existence. As Willy finds himself less and less capable, he still dreams of making it big and has visions of Uncle Ben who gives him advice on how to get rich, but never the kind of advice Willy wants to hear. Willy is concerned about his image. He is a great showman who ... ...

• Word Count: 709
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: High School

... own inability to change with it, will seal his fate. Willy Loman is finding himself less and less capable. He dreams of making it big and has visions of Uncle Ben who gives him advice on how to get rich, but never the kind of advice Willy wants to hear. Willy is concerned about his image. He is a great showman who ... ...

• Word Count: 653
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: High School

... also flourished, probably first performed in the winter of 1596-7 and regularly acted throughout the seventeenth century. In 1640, in a commendatory poem to Shakespeare's Poems, Leonard Digges noted that, while Ben Jonson's plays could no longer dependably attract an audience large enough to cover the costs of production, Shakespeare's play was still a certain hit: "let but Falstaff come, / Hall [i.e. Hal], Poines ... ...

• Word Count: 1901
• Approx Pages: 8
• Grade Level: Undergraduate

... 't hear him all that well, I feel that it did add to the personality of the character. The character that was most audible and understandable was Michaels James Flaherty, played by Ben Cole. Though his character in the play wasn"t my particular favorite, he was at least clear. At the end of act three, he wants Shawn to fight Christy. Throughout this ... ...

• Word Count: 1186
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

... understand the tragedy of the play. Willy has his own beliefs and ways of doing things just lie any "common man" "a man can't go out the way he came in, Ben, a man has got to add up to something" ...

• Word Count: 934
• Approx Pages: 4
• Grade Level: High School

... expressions. For example, when Willy is in Howard's office asking for a new position, they describe him as "staring off into space" (1390), while he has the vision of his brother Ben. When I was reading that portion of the script, I imagined Willy's reflections, as a relaxing or soothing experience that calmed him down. On the contrary, when I viewed this act in the movie ... ...

• Word Count: 1193
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

... by saying the coach would probably be proud of Biff for taking the initiative to practice. Later, Willy actually sends his sons out to steal lumber, in order to impress Ben. Willy's lack of morality on the issue of honesty greatly affects Biff and his ability to hold a job. Like Willy, Happy also lies to himself about his work and about ... ...

• Word Count: 1309
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

... come out on top. Sadly, he doesn't realise that the only way an ordinary person can get rich is through work (represented by Bernard) or through luck and good timing (Ben), and Willy missed the boat when it came to luck. The boys grew up to believe in all that their father had told them, and Happy went on to follow ... ...

• Word Count: 1139
• Approx Pages: 5
• Grade Level: High School

... a leading conservative talk show host, and Myra is working for an abortion clinic with her life partner Sarah. Myrna is estranged from her son Kenny and she meets her nephew Ben for the first time. She learns of an opportunity to bomb the Planned Parenthood building. Thinking no one will be there; Myrna is confronted by Sarah and is mistaken for ... ...

• Word Count: 697
• Approx Pages: 3
• Grade Level: High School