Quotations+-+Death+of+a+Salesman

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** Key Quotations - Death of a Salesman ** (not in chronological order) __ The American Dream/False Hope & Ideals __

Charley: -Willy was a salesman. And for a salesman, there is no rock bottom to the life. – A salesman has got to dream, boy.

Happy: I’m not liked that easily. I’m staying right in this city and I’m gonna beat this racket!

Willy: Be liked and you will never want. You take me, for instance. I never have to wait in line to see a buyer. “Willy Loman is here!” That’s all they have to know, and I go right through.

Linda; It’s changing, Willy, I can feel it changing!

Biff: - Because if he saw the kind of man you are, and you just talked to him your way, I’m sure he’d come through for me. – You know the way you could talk.

Linda: - Why must everybody conquer the world? You’re well liked, and the boys love you, and someday- he’ll be a member of the firm-

Willy: - A man can’t go out the way he came in, Ben, a man has for to add up to something.

Happy: Dad is never so happy as when he’s looking forward to something!

Willy: -cause one thing, boys: I have friends.-

Willy: - In those days there was personality in it, Howard. There was respect, and comradeship, and gratitude in it. Today it’s all cut and dried, and there’s no chance for bringing friendship to bear – or personality. You see what I mean? They don’t know me any more.

Willy (about Biff): Like a young god. Hercules – something like that. And the sun, the sun all around him. – God Almighty, he’ll be great yet. A star like that, magnificent, can never really fade away!

Willy: What’s the mystery? The man knew what he wanted and went out and got it! Walked into a jungle, and comes out – and he’s rich! The world is an oyster, but you don’t crack it open on a mattress!

Willy: What – what’s the secret? (Act II)

Willy: - I’ll get him a job selling. He could be big in no time. –

Willy: I was sellin’ thousands and thousands, but I had to come home. The trouble was that three of the stores were half closed for inventory in Boston. Otherwise I woulda broke records.

__ IRONY/Hypocritical statements __ Willy: Chevrolet, Linda, is the greatest car ever built. That goddam Chevrolet, they ought to prohibit the manufacture of that car!

Willy: Even your grandfather was better than a carpenter. You never grew up. (at Biff) Charley: When the hell are you going to grow up? (at Willy, Act II)

Willy: No, you finish first. Never leave a job until you’re finished – remember that. Willy: After high school he took so many correspondence courses. Radio mechanics; television; God knows what, and never made the slightest mark.

__ PATHOS __ Linda: - He’s not the finest character that ever lived. But he’s a human being, and a terrible thing is happening to him. So attention must be paid. He’s not to be allowed to fall into his grave like an old dof. Attention, attention must be finally paid to such a person.

Linda – And what goes through a man’s mind, driving seven hundred miles home without having earned a cent? – And you tell me he has no character? The man who never worked a day but for your benefit? When does he the medal for that? Is this his reward –

Linda: He’s the dearest man in the world to me, and I won’t have anyone making him feel unwanted and low and blue. – Either he’s your father and you pay him that respect, or else you’re not to come here.-

Linda: - Because he’s only a little boat looking for a harbor. Oh that’s wonderful, Biff, you’ll save his life.

Happy: I’m losing weight, you notice, Pop? (x3), I’m getting married (x3)

__ Death __ Willy: Slept like a dead one. First time in months.

Willy: I’m tired to the death.

Charley: Willy, nobody’s worth nothin’ dead. Did you hear what I said?

__ Tangible success __ Ben: What are you building? Lay your hand on it. Where is it?

Willy: Nothing’s planted. I don’t have a thing in the ground.

Ben: That’s a point William. And twenty thousand – that //is// something one can feel with the hand, it is there.

Willy: I see it like a diamond, shining in the dark, hard and rough – it changes all the aspects. Because he things I’m nothing, see, and so he spites me. But the funeral – I am known! – He’ll see what I am, Ben!-

Willy: If old man Wagner was alive, I’d a been in charge of New York now! That man was a prince, he was a masterful man. But that boy of his, that Howard, he don’t appreciate-

__ :( ____ Reality __ Biff: Pop! I’m a dime a dozen, and you are you!

Biff: I am not a leader of men, Willy, and neither are you. You were never anything but a hard-working drummer – you’re going to stop waiting for me to bring them (prizes) home!

Howard: This is no time for false pride, Willy.

Biff: - They’ve laughed at Dad for years, and you know why? Because we don’t belong in this nuthouse of a city! We should be mixing cement on some open plain, or – or carpenters. A carpenter is allowed to whistle!

Biff: - I know he’s a fake and he doesn’t like anybody around who knows!

Biff: I realized what a ridiculous lie my whole life has been. (Act II)

Biff: You fake! You phony little fake! You fake!

Biff: You’re practically full of it! We all are! And I’m through with it.

Biff: - We’ve been talking in a dream for fifteen years.

Biff: -Will you take that phony dream and burn it before something happens?

__ Failure/Ignorance/Shame __ Willy: - He flunked the subject, and laid down and died like a hammer hit him!

Willy: - It keeps going around in my mind, maybe I did something to him. I got nothing to give him.

Willy: How can he find himself on a farm? Is that a life? A farmhand? In the beginning, when he was young, I thought, well, a young man, it’s good for him to tramp around, take a lot of different jobs. But it’s more than ten years now and he has yet to make thirty-five dollars a week!

Willy: Ben, nothing’s working out. I don’t know what to do.

Willy: Why? Does it take more guts to stand here the rest of life ringing up a zero?

Ben: -Great inventor, Father. With one gadget he made more in a week than a man like you could make in a lifetime.

Biff: Hap, the trouble is we weren’t brought up to grub for money, I don’t know how to do it. Willy: Spite, spite is the word of your undoing! – and don’t you dare blame it on me!

Biff: - Dad, you’re not letting me tell you what I want to tell you!

Willy: Oh, I’ll knock ‘em dead next week. I’ll go to Hartford. I’m very well liked in Hartford. You know, the trouble is, Linda, people don’t seem to take to me. Willy: I know it when I walk in. They seem to laugh at me. Willy: - they just pass me by. I’m not noticed. Willy: I can’t stop myself – I talk too much. Willy: I’m fat. I’m very – foolish too look at, Linda. – But they do laugh at me. I know that.

Willy: Will you stop mending stockings? At least while I’m in the house. It gets me nervous. I can’t tell you. Please.

Ben: It’s called a cowardly thing William.

// Biff is two years older than his brother Happy, well built, but in these days bears a worn air and seems less self-assured. He has succeeded less, and his dreams are stronger and less acceptable than Happy’s. // // - he has never allowed himself to turn his face toward defeat and is thus more confused and hard-skinned, although seemingly more content. //