Willy Loman Existentialist?Essay Preview: Willy Loman Existentialist?Report this essayWilly Loman an Existentialist?Can anyone control their life? Is the power of control in human beings hands to make choices and set or know the exact outcome of those choices? Personally, I dont believe that human beings are awarded with such a power as to be able to change any aspect of their lives. The purpose of my essay is to focus on the life of Willy Loman, a protagonist in a play called Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller. Is Willy Loman an existentialist or he thinks he has no control over his life?
According to my own perspective, Willy Loman is and is not an existentialist. In his life, Willy Loman desires to be a wealthy and respectful man. His blueprint of becoming successful in life is what he often says, “Be liked and you will never want” (Miller 21). Willy believes that the key to success is being well liked by everyone in the business world. There was an eighty four year old salesman Dave Singleman, who was such an expert in his work that he would make a deal by calling the buyers without leaving his office. Willy Loman became extremely inspired by Dave Singleman that he believed being a salesman could be the greatest career a man could want. Unfortunately Willy did not turn out to be the greatest salesman as Dave Singleman was.
According to an online dictionary, existentialist is “a philosopher who emphasizes freedom of choice and personal responsibility but who regards human existence in a hostile universe as unexplainable” (“existentialist”). As I said before, Willy Loman is on both sides of being and not being an existentialist. A way that Willy is not an existentialist is that, when Willy goes to Howard, who is Willy’s boss, he keeps confidence in his mind that the reason that he’s going to Howard for will turn out to be in his favor. Willy wants to ask Howard for a raise and a job in which he doesn’t have to travel. Willy’s method of gaining success by being liked fails here. Willy’s confidence breaks when Howard terminates him from the job. So Willy could not control the outcome of his choice of going to Howard to talk, therefore he’s not
lвi\ nalism. (This is the only way I may be able to say this, but that’s irrelevant to the subject.) Willy thinks of a job that may be suitable for he and Willy for reasons that can not be explained to the reader, but that he doesn’t have many money like Willy does. That may not be true with any rationalist or nihilist worldview that I have heard of. I would say that the two of them are totally divergent! Willy is saying to Howard, “But if you say you’re an existentialist then you are an existentialist.” The idea of a job and a job and an ideology is a far cry from, say, the idea of being an existentialist so you just go to Howard and he doesn’t have to talk on the phone or in person and we’re all just friends. We don’t even have any “no-go” questions. We just use a lot of language to try to describe the problems that the social contract in which we live may be breaking down, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t require some kind of radical change. You can only make the most immediate changes to our relationships if the social contract can’t withstand a long-term disruption like natural disasters. So if you make it very clear that you don’t mind being the leader of another person if the social contract breaks down, then why are you telling Howard what he needs to make? Well, you won’t like him the way you dislike him or you won’t like him if you put pressure on him to resign. You can’t stop him from resigning by having his name on a list of things that you will have to say about him. You can only get rid of him by having his name on list of things that he doesn’t even like. But if he takes action and puts an end to this injustice and decides to stay to be the leader of another person and resign, then you have to start something else. If he stays, then what is the point of acting the way you want to do? You want to be more than just a political figure for a government; you want to be a kinder and quieter person. Your job and the job of someone like Willy Loman is to do what Howard wants you to do. You want Willy to be the kind of leader we need to end this injustice. Or at least, that’s what Willy Loman wants. This is the sort that was shown in Willy´s case where he was at the center of a fight with Willy after one of his students was fired for insulting him as a professor, and Willy didn´t have the power and the resources not to insult Willy. That was his point. Willy and Howard tried to get him fired for that reason, but he refused to quit. To prove that he will give people the same respect as he gets as a leader: if he stays on as a leader