Tanyatorn Sahapitaksin

English 1209

Miller’s ​Death of a Salesman ​Presents the Idea of American Culture Affecting on Linda

Being a good wife is not an easy task as people think since there are many

responsibilities that require wife to be. In ​Death of a Salesman​, Linda,one of the main

characters, is Willy’s wife. She is such a strong woman who has to bear everything in this

house since she has to do housework, support her husband, as well as take care her two sons.

Death of a salesman,​ written by Arthur Miller, displays how American culture shape Linda’s

identities to be an attentive, supportive, and protective wife.

By observing through Linda’s action and personality, it presents that her identities

represent a perfect wife impacted by American culture. In ​Death of a salesman​, Willy has to

go to work outside while Linda has to ​stay awake in order to wait for her husband to go

home. ​When Willy arrives, she immediately asks him many questions with anxiety. Just a

few minute, she can notice that Willy does not look good, “Don’t you feel well?” (Miller p.

13). She then tells Willy, “Well, you’ll just have to take a rest, Willy, you can’t continue this

way” (Miller p.13). Linda then takes care him by asking the basically physical needs, “Take

an aspirin. Should I get you an aspirin? It’ll soothe you” (Miller, p. 14). Next, Linda also says

that she will make him a sandwich when Willy asks for food (Miller, p. 15). In American

culture, it is generally known that it is not duty of woman that has to work outside to help

husband earn money. On the other hand, wife’s duty is to stay at home to support husband

and to do house work. Since Linda knows that Willy puts a lot of effort on working, and he

must be aweary. According to act one, Willy meets Linda as the first person when he arrives

home, it obviously implies that Linda is waiting for Willy to come back home. Linda knows

that he needs someone to take care and to help him release the feeling of exhausted after
driving all day long, and it is definite that it has to be Linda herself. Therefore, Linda

comforts him as much as possible, and she tries to make Willy’s life easy as much as she can

to release Willy’s stress and tiredness. Besides that, the way Linda talks to Willy also points

out that she concerns about Willy. The actions that Linda always does to Willy will let him

know that she is worried, care, and always be beside him.

In addition, Biff frequently has arguments with Willy about his future career, so Linda

is doing her role by offending for Willy. In ​Death of a Salesman​, in act one, when Linda

hears Biff abuses Willy that Willy does not have character, he is crazy, and he loses himself,

she madly explains the reasonable fact to Biff, “A small man can be just as exhausted as a

great man. He works for a company thirty-six years this March, opens up unheard-of

territories to their trademark, and now in his old age they take his salary away” (Miller, p.

56). According to this situation, it presents that American culture has big impacts on Linda.

The reason is that she really takes it serious on her role due to the fact that she does not only

take care family members and clean the house, but she also offends for Willy. Linda is the

only family member who protects Willy due to the fact that she is the person who knows

Willy the best. Linda does not want other people to get him wrong, in particular her two sons.

She protects him by explaining the truth and fact that Biff and Happy do not know because

based on what Biff says, Biff and Happy do not know how much effort Willy puts on his job.

This also shows that Linda is the middle person who connects Willy and two sons to have

good family relationship since she has to keep both side calm. As a result, impact of

American culture ​affects Linda to do wife’s duty very well.

To conclude, American culture in 1950s affects wife to be the person who has to

attend, support, and protect husband and children as well as has to do house work. Comparing

between American culture in the past and Thai culture in the present, i​t has a huge difference.
In the modern world, more and more female do not stay at home and clean house only, but

they works outside as similar as male. Some wife might still clean the house and cook for

their husband, but some decide to employ a person to do that job instead of doing it herself.

However, No matter how times change, supporting and protecting husband are still wife’s

job.
 Considerate

Every single person in this world is free to shape their own identities, and to decide

who they want to be, however some identities are influenced by culture or place they live in.

My identity, influenced by Thai culture, is considerate. I often feel that I am afraid of

offending to other people especially with my dad. There are three examples that will support

this idea.

The first situation is that when I was in the last year of primary school, I wanted to go

to school party. My parents allowed me to go to that party, but there was a condition which

was that my father had to go with me. When I bought seats for mine and my father, I did not

know why we were separated from each other, so my father sat in the table next to my table. I

felt very bad that noone sat in that table because they were afraid of my father. At that night, I

felt uncomfortable, and considerate that he had to sit lonely to wait for me to have fun with

my friends. I was in the party only one hour. I then decided to go home because I did not

want him to be alone in the strange place and had no friends.

Another example is that my father hates traffic jam, so he always tells me that I

should go home as fast as possible because if not the bridge will be closed and we will face to

traffic jam for an hour. When I was in grade 10, I did not understand his purpose of why we

had to go home quickly because I wanted to play and talk with my friends before go home, so

I decided to ignore what my father said, and I talked and played with my friends almost an

hour. When I got into the car, my dad was angry, but I did not understand why he had to be

mad at me since I just wanted to play with my friends. I did not answer him and even

apologize him. Then, when I arrived home, I notice that my father could not do the activity
that he had planned due to the fact that we came home too late. I felt considerate and myself

is selfish because I only thought and cared myself. I wanted to have fun without thinking that

my father had to wait in the car, to face to traffic jam, and could not do what he wanted. Not

only that, while he was driving, I was sleeping. I woke up when I arrived home. It caused me

to feel so bad. After that day, I have never been late again. I will go home as early as I can. If

I have to do work after class, I will let him know and do work as fast as possible because I do

not want him to not be able to do what he want.

The last example is that last two years I had to do silent film, but I had to take video

on Saturday because we could not do it at school due to place. I wanted my father to take me

to the place where my friends and I were going to do work and take me home without caring

that there were anything he wanted to do or he wanted to take a rest. I just thought that it was

nothing since he just drove me and went back home without thinking how far the place it

was, and the amount of time that he wasted. Morevore, I found that he did not wait at home

instead he waited for me at the nearest mall around half of the day, it caused me to feel

considerate, and I never want to work at the place that is far from my home or work on

weekend because I do not want to disturb his free time.

In short, everytime that I feel this way does not cause because he directly tells me that

I have to feel considerate, but I just have this feeling myself. I do not know the exact reason

of feeling of being afraid of offending, so I think that maybe it is because Thai culture

impacts me to have this identity.