Growing up humans learn how important relationships are. Everyone must deal with relationships, whether it be family, friends, significant others or people we do not like. A relationship is simply a bond between one person and another. As one grows older relationships become more and more important in one's life. Without relationships one would be very lonely because it is a human necessity to have connections with others. In the play Death of a Salesman Arthur Miller identifies the relationships of Willy Loman and his family. Miller also focuses on the relationship that Willy Loman has with society. The relationships that Willy has make up an underlying theme that runs throughout the entire play. .
Willy Loman is a failed salesman in a success-oriented society. His main crime is that he believes the propaganda of a society only has room for winners. The play's theme shows how a victim of "The American Dream" can be destroyed by false promises. These promises not only impact one's business life, but also set up conflicts with interpersonal relations. Despite Willy's goals to become successful in his career, he spends most of his life being in the shadow of the top salesmen. Willy lives in an apartment where there are no signs of greenery, no views of nature that come to represent positive values in the play. The world outside Willy's small and fragile home seems oppressive and menacing, threatening to swallow up an economic failure, like Willy.
His son Biff echoes Willy's goals and ambitions throughout the play. Biff says: "Well, I spent six or seven years after high school trying to work myself up. Shipping clerk, salesman, and business of one kind or another. And it's a measly manner of existence. To get on that subway on the hot mornings in summer. To devote your whole life to keeping stock, or making phone calls, or selling or buying. To suffer fifty weeks of the year for the sake of a two-week vacation, when all you really desire is to be outdoors with your shirt off.
