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Death of a Salesman Success and Happiness. Answer the following question in a few brief sentences: What is your own definition of success? Does it involve.

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Presentation on theme: "Death of a Salesman Success and Happiness. Answer the following question in a few brief sentences: What is your own definition of success? Does it involve."— Presentation transcript:

1 Death of a Salesman Success and Happiness

2 Answer the following question in a few brief sentences: What is your own definition of success? Does it involve money? Does it involve personal happiness? Does it involve fame or fortune?

3 Success Death of a Salesman is a tragedy dealing with success and the American Dream. Everyone has a different vision of what they picture as “successful”. For some people this involves money in some form. For others, it may revolve around personal and emotional happiness. In either case, it usually involves reaching an ideal goal. Keep this in mind as we begin to read this play. What does success mean to you?

4 Who is Arthur Miller? Arthur Miller was born in New York, New York on October 17, 1915. He was born into a middle-class Jewish family. Lived in Brooklyn during high school, played on the football team, and worked as a delivery boy in the mornings. Attended a local community college after high school and dropped out after two weeks. Then he attended University of Michigan where he began to write and quickly became involved in journalism and playwriting.

5 Who is Arthur Miller? Once he arrived at Michigan he quickly fell into playwriting and realized he had a talent for writing after winning several awards. He wrote Death of a Salesman in 1949. This is one of his most widely known works. Afterwards, he wrote several other plays such as The Crucible. This is his other most widely known work. It compares the Red scare in America to the Salem witch trials of the Puritans. He was also married to Marilyn Monroe for quite a few years which stands as a testimony to his notoriety. Arthur Miller died on February 10, 2005.

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10 What themes appear in Death of a Salesman? Death of a Salesman deals with the American Dream, much like The Great Gatsby or Of Mice and Men. Themes: –Success –Virtue –American Dream –Failure –Family Relationships –Expectations vs. Reality Awards: –Received the Pulitzer prize for Drama in 1949. –Also received the Tony Award for best play in the same year.

11 Critics Death of a Salesman is one of the few tragedies published in the past century. –Typically, when we think of tragedy we think of Shakespeare or the Greeks, for they wrote most of the tragedies we read today. Critics also view the main character as being an anti- hero. For the most part, Death of a Salesman is one of the most important American plays ever written. Miller is known as one of the greatest critics of American government and policy during the Cold War. Death of a Salesman has become a household name because of its significance in modern family life.

12 Also… This play has been alluded to in the following programs: –The Simpsons –Family Guy –Jimmy Neutron –Seinfeld I guess that means it’s good, right?

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14 The Organization Man by William H. Whyte "Recognized as a benchmark, Whyte's book reveals the dilemmas at the heart of the group ethos that emerged in the corporate and social world of the postwar era."—Nathan Glazer "The Organization Man is one of the most influential books of the twentieth century. It established the categories Americans now use when thinking about the workplace, the suburbs, and their lives."— David Brooks, senior editor at the Weekly Standard and contributing editor at Newsweek What ideas cross your mind when you see the following picture.

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