Themes And Techniques In Death Of A Salesman From The Perspective Of Marxist Criticism

Arthur Miller is an important realistic playwright in contemporary American literature. Death of a Salesman, his masterpiece, has attracted much attention since its first performance. It is the winner of the Pulitzer Prize, the Drama Critics' Circle Award and other awards. Death of a Salesman brings Arthur Miller the international reputation as a realistic playwright. It is considered as a modern classic of the American theater.Since its first performance, Death of a Salesman, depicting a sad version of the American dream, has been the focus of critics. Most critics pay much attention to the analysis of the plot, theme, Arthur Miller's theatre theory and creative expression. Regretfully, little has been done to link the themes and techniques of this play with the viewpoints of Marxist critics.In consideration of Arthur Miller's life experience as one of the proletariat and his understanding of Marxism, this thesis attempts to analyze the themes and techniques in Death of a Salesman from the perspective of Marxist criticism, especially from the points of view of two Marxist critics—Georg Lukacs (1885-1971) and Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956). This thesis studies the realistic themes and the modernist techniques in Death of a Salesman and aims to demonstrate that Death of a Salesman is an impressive realistic play by means of the various techniques of modernism.This thesis consists of six parts, with four chapters coming between the introduction and the conclusion.The first part is the introduction. The background information of Death of a Salesman is introduced in this part, which proves that it is feasible to analyze this play from the perspective of Marxist criticism. In addition, this part also introduces the plot of the play, the purpose and the organization of this thesis.Chapter One is the literature review. This chapter focuses on the studies of Death of a Salesman at home and abroad. Most critics pay much attention to the analysis of the themes, the theory of tragedy and the theatrical techniques in Death of a Salesman. Few of them analyze the themes and techniques of this play from the perspective of Marxist criticism.Chapter Two concentrates on the main theory of Marxist criticism, especially on the viewpoints of two Marxist critics—Georg Lukacs and Bertolt Brecht. Georg Lukacs is the first Western Marxist critic. He insists that literature is not only a reflection of reality, but also a critique of this reality as well. Bertolt Brecht is another famous Marxist critic. He develops Lukacs's theory and suggests that writers should use whatever means to explore and reflect reality.Chapter Three from Lukacs's typical Marxist viewpoint on literature deals with the realistic themes and significance of the play, which is expressed by using the techniques of modernism. There are two themes analyzed in this chapter. One theme is about the disillusionment of the American dream that will mainly focus on the failure of Willy Loman. Another theme is about the betrayal that is seldom touched upon before. This thesis attempts to classify the kinds of betrayal in Death of a Salesman and explores the reasons for betrayal.Chapter Four explores the theatrical devices of modernism used to foreground the realistic themes in Death of a Salesman from Bertolt Brecht's point of view on literature. In this part two kinds of techniques of modernism used in this play will be analyzed—the techniques of expressionism and symbolism. This chapter analyzes the employment of expressionist techniques from the aspects of stage setting and flashbacks in the form of stream of consciousness. The employment of techniques of symbolism is demonstrated by analyzing the symbols, including characters, diamond, seeds and so on.In the last part, the thesis concludes that Death of a Salesman is really an impressive play. Arthur Miller fuses the realistic themes and various techniques of modernism skillfully in Death of a Salesman and makes it a remarkable play with the perfect combination of realism and modernism.