Miller John Proctor, As Arthur Term Paper

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It becomes his way of escaping reality. The boundaries between the past and the present are withdrawn in his fantasies, where his illusions become real. But the truth is that the family is in severe financial condition and, in the end, Willy decides to commit suicide by driving and crashing himself to death so that his insurance money could be used to establish a business for his eldest son, Biff. He also intends to prove to Biff during his funeral that he is popular among people. Willy, in comparison to John Proctor in Miller's previous fiction, does not attain the status of a tragic hero because he does not come to full self-realization as does John Proctor. The play does not become a pure tragedy and Willy is viewed as an anti-hero, instead in that he fails to develop the nobility and magnanimity in traditional and tragic heroes. He falls short of the self-realization or self-knowledge of the typical tragic hero. His decision to commit suicide represents only a partial discovery of the truth. He fails to realize and confront his personal failure and to grasp a true, personal understanding of himself as an every man. Instead, he gives in to the force of a desperate mind and a distorted vision of a materialistic future for his family, especially Biff by killing himself (Miller, Wikipedia).

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In contrast with Willy, his son Bliff seeks the truth about himself and acknowledges his failure rather than denies it (Miller 1949, Wikipedia 2006). His father and brother Happy are of a kind in refusing to accept the miseries of their respective lives and deceive themselves. Biff also loses respect for his father when he discovers his unfaithfulness. Willy covers up for these by regarding Biff as an under-achiever. Biff is determined to break the stream of lies surrounding and afflicting their family to come to terms with his own life. He endeavors to confront his father's fantasy and release himself from it and into freedom. His father's blind obsession over his materialistic interpretation of the American dream has created that barrier for Biff. He undergoes an identity crisis, during which he realizes the need to expose the fantasy and pain of Willy's disillusionment over himself, his true failures. Biff sees that this is the only way to go through the crisis and establish his own and separate identity from his father and his distorted dream. Biff, rather than Willy, achieves that nobility and magnanimity required of traditional tragic heroes and thus qualifies as one (Miller, Wikipedia)......

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