Why is willy loman not a tragic hero

This happens to Oedipus when he realizes that he's inadvertently killed his father and slept with his mother. You could argue that Willy has a small realization near the end of the play. He never says it directly, but at some point—probably after Howard fires him—he must realize that he's just never going to succeed in business.

If he didn't come to this realization, then he wouldn't decide to kill himself so Biff could use his life insurance money. However, though Willy must make some small realization toward the end of the play, we hesitate to label it as full blown anagnorisis. Willy definitely goes to his death amid a cloud of delusion. Even after Biff totally lays it out for his dad that all he wants to do is be a cowboy or whatever, Willy refuses to understand. The pitiful salesman kills himself, thinking that Biff will use the life insurance money to start a business.

It becomes painfully obvious at the funeral that this is totally not going to happen, showing that Willy went to his death without coming to grips with reality. Yes, it seems that, unlike many classical Greek tragic heroes, Willy doesn't have a major anagnorisis. Willy is also different from his tragic predecessors because he isn't royalty of any kind.

Yep, Willy is just a salesman. He has no real power in the world, and not too many people really care when he dies. Unlike the legendary and powerful Oedipus, Willy is a nobody. But why would Arthur Miller try to write a tragedy about a total schmuck?

Did he not read Aristotle's book or something? Hardly—we're guessing that Miller knew Aristotle's ideas better than we do. It turns out that the fact that Willy is an everyday guy is part of the whole point Miller is trying to make.

In Arthur Miller's famous essay, "Tragedy of the Common Man," he states, "I believe that the common man is as apt a subject for tragedy in its highest sense as kings were. It's that fact that they share the same problems as we do today, the same flaws, fears, and hopes.

Some critics have said that true tragedy is impossible when your hero is a common man. They say that when an everyday guy goes down, not as many people suffer as they would if it were a king. OK, sure, but we have a question: is the size of a tragedy really limited to the world of the play? They realize they have made an irreversible mistake, faces death with honor, and dies tragically. The audience also has to be affected by pity or fear for the tragic hero.

In order for Willy Loman to be a tragic hero, he has to fulfill all of these descriptions. Willy Loman fits into some of …show more content… He then gouges out his eyes and wonders of into the desert 4. Willy Loman is the son of a middle-class man.

He has been working as a traveling salesman for the last forty years. Willy evokes pity and fear from the audience, and suffers due to his own fatal flaw, or hamartia, which Elia Kazan, the first director of 'Death of a Salesman', believed to be "neuroses and anxiety.

Literary critic, Professor Harold Bloom claims that Willy Loman is not a tragic hero by Aristotelian standards because he "does not fall from a great height, nor does he come to any realization of his complicity in the event. Traditionally tragic heroes are men of high standing, princes, kings and generals, who fail and eventually die due to a fatal flaw, or hamartia.

Aristotle would not have considered 'Death of a Salesman' a tragedy, because a tragedy must show a person who is worth serious attention. He, therefore, loses his dignity.

One of his biggest errors is his failure of be a good father. And does not hold a rightful position in his family. He believes he is a very successful salesman and well liked. He also thinks that the company likes what he is doing. After he got fired charley offered him a job, but he refuses to accept, because he is too proud and jealous to work for Charley.

His actions were wrong because at no time was a successful salesman. He is not a powerful character. Willy lives in his fantasies where he is the man. Who goes out to another place and comes out rich, he is love by everyone and admired by his family.