Various conflicts in the family gradually emerged from the conversations of the family of four. My husband is getting old, his work is not going well, and the family is barely making ends meet. The eldest son has not achieved anything in the outside world, his dreams cannot be realized, and the gap with reality is too great. The younger son lingers among the butterflies and is tired of the false and flattering work and life in the city. But only this gentle wife and kind mother, who mediate between the father and son, are struggling to support a family in danger.
The husband was chronically on the verge of a nervous breakdown, and the wife struggled to persuade her sons to forgive their father. So, by accident, in the communication between father and son, the husband regained hope that he was going to fight for the opportunity to stay in New York to work, and the sons also wanted to work together in a big business. It seems that the bright future is very close to them, very close, and at their fingertips.
However, the reality is cruel. That's why the husband committed suicide.
The husband could not persuade the boss to take care of his old employee from a human perspective. The son has neither the guts nor the strength to borrow money from the big boss to sell his entrepreneurial idea. Then, the reality smashed all the dreams fiercely. The husband just wanted to use his death to get the last insurance payment and keep the last hope.
The youngest son is romantic, and at the end he refutes his older brother's argument of focusing on reality, but his romance is only superficial and false, because he has not learned the merits of his father's optimism and diligence.
The salesman is a complex, tragic figure. He easily reminds us of ourselves in real life, with a humble identity but desperate for face, working hard to support his family, blindly optimistic but not denying his failures. He has a lot of bright spots, but also a lot of shortcomings. Ordinary people are such a state of life. When reality cannot fill the emptiness of the soul, they can only numb themselves with dreams. If they are lucky, they will gain new motivation from it and make a comeback. If they are unfortunate, they will hit nails everywhere and end up doing nothing. But when it comes to tragic characters, I think the biggest root of them is that his values run counter to the values of society. In the salesman's world, "people are good, everyone likes me", "I love my son, and my son worships me", this is the happiest thing in the world, and it is also the reason why he lives. In society, money is the basis of people's communication. If it is not like a young son who is playing with flowers and entertainment, then the relationship between people is maintained by personal interests. The ending of the character is a tragedy, and the tragedy is not him, but the society.
The salesman's wife is a virgin woman. She has worked hard for this family all her life, knows the secrets behind everything that happens in the family, handles conflicts with tolerance and understanding, and is a near-perfect woman. The wife is omniscient, she knows that her husband has had suicidal thoughts, that the family is unable to make ends meet, that she knows the reason for the discord between her son and her father, and that she can only live with the mentality of "one day is another day". However, she never shows weakness, and has almost no shortcomings to follow. She is both realistic and ideal. Compared with the idealism of her husband and the realism of her son, she is a virgin-like figure, flawless.
The tone is heavy, and the contradictions are laid out in advance. As far as the plot is concerned, there doesn't seem to be any bright spots. But the theme of the play is eternal. No matter what era, finding a balance between dreams and reality has always been the biggest problem in this world.
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