Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller and Our Town by Thornton Wilder In the road of life, the right path may not always be where the road signs lead . The path to self-discovery is found by following your heart and mind and wherever they may lead you. In the plays Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller and Our Town by Thornton Wilder, parallel paths and opposite connections can be established between the characters who coincide in both. In Death of a Salesman, Willy Loman is the portrait of a sixty-year-old man who reflects on his past, full of lies and desperation. Learning about his past, he finally and fatally finds himself at the end of his life. Our Town's Mr. Webb plays a Grover's Corner Sentinel editor and Emily's loving father. At the beginning of the show, he displays knowledge about his own self-discovery, which he hopes to tell others. Mr. Webb, who discovered himself, consistently raised Emily as a woman who finally recognized the value of life. Married to George Gibbs, her life was very comparable to that of Linda Loman, married to Willy Loman. Linda Loman was a woman dedicated to her spouse's needs, but therefore also blind to the real needs that Willy desired. In the end, she was still left wondering why or what went wrong. Linked by protruding parallel traits of progressive self-awareness, these characters advanced the two plays to a higher level of understanding. The similar life philosophies that reside in both Willy Loman and Mr. Webb are present in both works as they progress. Their strong self-confidence gives them the ability to influence others by giving them advice. The advice Mr. Webb provided to George was to “start early by showing who's boss” (Wilder IIi 58). The confidence to say this to a strong-willed son-in-law shows his aptitude for faith. Likewise, Willy often dictated the actions of the people around him. Usually his interferences would be contradictory to what others had in mind, such as “No, finish first” (Miller 1.3). His constant dictations very often cause contradictions with his dictations! At first, Willy referred to Biff as "a lazy bum" (Miller 1.2), but then called him "a hard worker" (Miller 1.2). This demonstrates Willy's belief in his ideas, but shows a confusion within those ideas. Mr. Webb also inherits Willy's same weakness. Describe...... half of the paper...... understand what the meaning of life is. Both Linda and Emily had many similar points in their journey to discovery, but in the end, one was left with questions and the other with longing. So, in conclusion, the road to self-discovery was an achievement that not everyone could achieve. Open-mindedness and the ability to try new things opened doors for Emily and Mr. Webb to perceive the meaning of life. They learned the lessons of self-discovery because there was no one holding them back. In a word, they were luckier than Willy and Linda because their path to discovery was easier and shorter. But Willy and Linda were not unlucky. There were many open opportunities where they could see their mistakes and what was right. Yet they could not do it because their character, of stubbornness and blindness, did not allow them to see these open windows. The window where opportunity lies is always open, our minds must be trained to perceive it and gain liberation from this existence. Work cited Miller, Arthur. Death of a salesman. www.public.iastate.edu/~spires/Concord/death.html.Wilder, Thorton. There, 1975.