Death of a Salesman

"I believe that the common man is as apt to a subject for tragedy in its highest sense as kings were." -Arthur Miller (from "Tragedy and the Common Man")

Last week, I attended Syracuse Stage's production of Arthur Miller's The Death of a Salesman, which was absolutely fabulous. The reference material the audience was given was absolutely incredible, giving wonderful pictures and writing on Miller and the play. I found myself devouring the reading material in the booklet before the play, wondering if this material would be interesting for future students. By the way, I did not know that Miller was romanticall involved with Marilyn Monroe... Interesting fact.

Viewing this play made me realize how impertive and crucial it is for us, as educators, to involve our students in cultural experiences like this. I read this play on my own, as an English nerd, but I will not remember it as fully and deeply as I will now that I have seen it performed. I will remember this performance perhaps more than my initial reading of words on paper. This play brought the plot and themes to life--an experience that we should introduce and instill for our students. This experience made me realize how valuable this experience is, and how I want to bring my students to these plays and events in order to instill a love and appreciation for performing arts, and of course, literature.

Students could even interpret the characters/setting/tone/etc. from the play itself. The stage was decorated wonderfully, represting the home of the common man quite well. I was thinking how interested I would be to hear what students thought about the layout of the stage and props. I was even curious of clothing selections; such topics would make for great discussion in class.

Above, I included a quote from Miller on the common man. I started my blog with this because it really connects to Freidman's points of this flattening world. He fears that we will have to many Willy Lomans in our future--people who are expendable and more like cogs in the machines than useful, innovative workers. We need to avoid preparing our students to become Willy Lomans, and instead, have free thikers who can produce and develop their abilities in versatile methods in a variety of ways (including technologically producing their ideas via internet blogging or iMovie). Our country will not keep up with other countries and companies if we produce Willy Lomans. We need to avoid shooting for average/the common man, and instead, aim higher than we want so that we can over-prepare students to compete in this ever-developing, growing, and changing world.

I do pity Willy though. I hope not to see more Willys in my future.