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Going to Meet the Man
(1965) |
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Death of a Salesman
(1950) |
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| "Then he just lay there, silent, angry and helpless. Excitement filled him like a toothache, but it refused to enter his flesh. He stroked her breast. This was his wife. He could not ask her to do just a little thing for him, just to help him out, just for a little while, the way he could ask a nigger girl to do it. He lay there and he sighed. The image of a black girl caused a distant excitement in him, like far-away light; but, again, the excitement was more like pain; instead of forcing him to act, it made action impossible." (2509) |
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| This quote demonstrates the relationship between sex and race in this story. Jesse, a man still competent for sexual activity cannot sexually perform with his own wife. Instead, he finds arousal through the adulterous thoughts of a black woman. This passage seems to highlight a sort of contrived sexual inferiority that accompanies this societies' racism because Jesse's wife cannot give him the pleasure he desires. The language of this quote demonstrates that the African American woman may fulfill this sexual pleasure and intimacy but she is viewed without any respect or value. Jesse refers to such a female as "nigger girl" and "black girl" as if they have no womanly tendencies or respectability simply based on their color. Jesse's wife, is described however as a precious and upright commodity with whom he would not dare ask sexual favors. Such line of thought is based on social pressures. |
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| "Well, I told you," said his father, "you wasn't never going to forget this picnic." His father's face was full of sweat, his eyes were very peaceful." (2520) |
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| This quote foreshadows the traumatic effects the public lynching holds on Jesse's worldview in later adulthood. It is indeed a moment that he will never forget, a moment that will mold his future life, actions and beliefs. The description of his father mirrors the characteristics of a post-orgasmic state; this emphasizes the connection between sex and race and shows the sexual satisfaction that he derives from the sight of the violence perpetrated against the Black man. |
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| "He could not tell whether [Grace] was listening or not; and he was afraid to ask again. [...] "He was lying on the ground jerking and moaning, they had threw him in a cell by himself and blood was coming out his ears from where Big Jim C and his boys had whipped him. Wouldn't you think they'd learn?"" (2511) |
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| This quote shows Jesse's desire to talk about his trauma to his wife. Trauma is a repetition and Jesse seems compelled to play again and again the traumatic event that he has previously experienced. He wants nonetheless this process to stop: it is as if, in this extract, he wished that Blacks would stop protesting so that he wouldn't have to punish them. This is an example of Jesse's intense traumatic suffering and also of the twisted logic that racism had created. |
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| Miller & Baldwin --> 1950s |
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Essay: Baldwin
Civil Rights Act
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
The Voting Rights Act |
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CRA- which prohibited racial discrimination in public facilities.
EEOC - known
VRA- definitively outlawing states from obstructing minorities’ efforts to vote through the implementation of "voting qualifications" (literacy tests and etc). |
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Essay (Miller)
American Dream
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American Dream- the common idea that freedom and liberty are inherent in the American identity, and that hard work is the key to success. Has been a driving force in American society and culture since the Founding Fathers' use of the phrase "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."
Response to: It's a Wonderful Life |
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| “He [Dexter] wanted not association with glittering things and glittering people–he wanted the glittering things themselves” |
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"Winter Dreams" (1922)
The directness of Dexter's desire colors it almost an obsession, an internal imperative to secure fancy possessions because Dexter uses them to validate his success in life. |
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| "Dexter had seen that, in one sense, he was better than these men. He was newer and stronger. Yet in acknowledging to himself that he wished his children to be like them he was admitting that he was but the rough, strong stuff from which this graceful aristocracy eternally sprang" |
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"Winter Dreams" (1922) Fitzgerald
Fitzgerald displays the tension between the idle, old money and the industrious, new money society of self-made entrepeneurs. Though Dexter is of the latter class, he aims to construct the factors that enable the old money in a system that reeks of decay. |
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| "He put his arm around her [Judy], commanded by her eyes. He kissed her curious and lovely mouth and committed himself to the following of a grail" |
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"Winter Dreams" Fitzgerald (1925)
Fitzgerald characterizes the old money society as a phantom: it is not for people who must pursue it, but only for those who had it already. If the Jones' lifestyle is that apex to which the American Dream aspires, it is a cruel and fatuous endeavor. |
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- the grand ideal that success can be had by anyone and is basically granted by the Constitution: life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The American Dream was debunked after the Great Depression made people realize that things beyond their control could affect their destiny. It became a too-simple story.
boiled down version: hard work = success, getting ahead, and upward mobility |
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