The tragic fall of Willy Loman and Hamlet Both Willy Loman and Hamlet suffered till their untimely death. Both were afflicted with corrupted families and were lost in understanding their role in life. For a character to be considered tragic, he/she must be of high moral estate, fall to a level of catastrophe, induce sympathy and horror in the audience, and usually die, and in doing so, re-establish order in the society.
This is easily traceable, using the classical definition of the tragic hero, through the short time that we get to visit Hamlet in his life. Hamlet clearly falls from grace and struggles to understand what has happened. On the other hand, Willy Loman, falls from a precieved sense of grace and is left to face his embellished self worth. Hamlet, the exuberant prince of Denmark proud of
...his rich moral standing is thrust to the brink of insanity when his father is suddenly torn from this life. Though Hamlet Sr. s initial cause of death is though to be natural causes, Hamlet later realizes that his uncle Claudius, Hamlet Sr. ’s brother, murdered him. Vowing revenge upon his Uncle, Hamlet begins to falter, quickly losing touch with reality. Leading up to his death he accidentally kills Polonius, loses his love Ophelia to suicide, and in the epic climax loses his mother, uncle friend and his own life to poison. Hamlet dies defeating his own demons though ultimately destroying all that he loved. Willy Loman suffered from delusions of grandeur.
Unlike Hamlet, Willy never was a great man, though he had built his life on unattainable dreams with no foundation. We meet Willy and his family
at a point where their lives are fully established, albeit in nothing. Willy has falsely convinced himself and his family that they are underrated important people consistently lingering at the verge of greatness. Willy’s demise is the false world that he has created crumbling down around him and his struggle to understand what it is that he is facing.
He flashes back through time to periods where he or his family were moments away from their big break, though we never see that attained. Willy breaks and retreats into a lucid state of dementia, eventually killing himself in what he thought was his best remaining option to deliver his family to greatness. The story closes with the family realizing that they were on the verge of mediocrity and that dream would have been attainable and fine. Hamlet and Willy both suffered tragic falls from greatness, weather real or perceived.
The classical definition of the tragedy was adapted to fit the modern day in the case of Willy, though the same result is ultimately attained. A common man's injured sense of dignity, coupled with forces beyond his control and/or ability to comprehend, displace him from his perceived place. This event allows the audience to recognize feel the loss and prepare itself for the climax in which the protagonist’s hopelessness and defeat are often more poignant than the actual death.
Willy and Hamlet both fell from grace; both committed morally bankrupt acts and died from them. Both men suffered through the final moments of life, losing all sense of control and struggling to regain their respective places on top. The tragedy is realized in that both men feel a sense
of hope just prior to their deaths, as they have their entire lives, that everything will be okay. We the audience are allowed to see that their fall, struggle and death are all in vein, and they die leaving little but pain on this earth. Both men tragic in both life and death.
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