Ragtime E. L. Loman Analysis

Society is an ever changing phenomenon in which social norms are constantly being called into question and altered. For instance, concepts like fashion, art, and music have transformed numerous times. However, one idea has been maintained in American mythology for decades. This is the belief that someone’s success comes from his or her annual income or how well he or she is able to conform to certain standards. Authors like E.L. Doctorow, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Arthur Miller created characters in their works that embrace this notion. In Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow, a character named Father creates his goal of a perfect life by having his family live in a secluded, upper middle class town away from immigrants and other minorities. F. Scott Fitzgerald

This hurt him in many ways because it prevented him from seeing the truth about himself, which would end up isolating him from his family. In the play, Willy’s own son told him that he was nothing special, and he was just an average man; Willy angrily replied, “I am not a dime a dozen! I am Willy Lowman,” (Miller 105). This moment explains the problems with Willy’s obsession of appearing perfect, because he pushed away his family who is trying to tell him the truth over a lie he told himself years ago. Since he refuse to acknowledge the truth, Willy begins to reminisce his ‘glory’ days and as a result felt he had nothing left to give towards the end of his life. Because of this, Willy felt as if he would be worth more dead than alive, that way his family would get a life insurance check and could start fresh. “Remember, it’s a guaranteed twenty-thousand-dollar proposition. Now look, Ben I want you to go through the ins and outs with me. I’ve got nobody to talk to, Ben, and the woman has suffered, you hear me?” (Miller 100). Willy alienated himself over lies he told to everyone around him in hopes of keeping up a fake