Journal

Follow the instructions attached and write a 1 page journal entry in MLA format for each selected story.

The Journal

 

The reader response journal should serve more as a tool to assist you in reading works from The Norton Anthology: American Literature than as an assignment for me to grade. It will help you to read actively, as a participant in a conversation with the text. You will use it to record your thoughts, feelings and ideas – your reactions to the readings. A record of such reactions teaches you important analysis skills, but without the punitive consequences of a check for errors in grammar, spelling, and punctuation. I will assess mechanics skills in your essays and exams, but not so much in journal entries, which again serve you, not me.

 

When I grade these I will check for two qualities:

1. Length – each entry should be at least one typed page.

2. Analysis – you must not, under any circumstances, summarize the text. Assume I’ve read the piece. Don’t tell me the story, poem, essay, etc. all over again. Instead, react to it – talk back to it – in your own words. However, you must refer to details from the text in order to convince me you’ve read.

 

You should have one typed journal entry per week. You may respond to any of the readings assigned for that week, but I recommend only taking on one reading at a time so as not to dilute your response. Don’t try to respond to everything. You learn more by focusing – by both zeroing in on and by deeply exploring a single text.

Journal 1

Zora Neale Hurston’s “How it Feels to be Colored Me”

Journal 2

William Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily”

Journal 3

Arthur Miller’s “Death of a Salesman Act 2”

Journal 4

Ginsburg’s “A Supermarket in California”

Journal 5

Silko’s “Lullaby”

Journal 6

Alexie — “Pawn Shop”

A Supermarket in California
Allen Ginsberg

What thoughts I have of you tonight, Walt Whitman, for

I walked down the sidestreets under the trees with a headache

self-conscious looking at the full moon.

In my hungry fatigue, and shopping for images, I went

into the neon fruit supermarket, dreaming of your enumerations!

What peaches and what penumbras! Whole families

shopping at night! Aisles full of husbands! Wives in the

avocados, babies in the tomatoes!–and you, Garcia Lorca, what

were you doing down by the watermelons?

I saw you, Walt Whitman, childless, lonely old grubber,

poking among the meats in the refrigerator and eyeing the grocery

boys.

I heard you asking questions of each: Who killed the

pork chops? What price bananas? Are you my Angel?

I wandered in and out of the brilliant stacks of cans

following you, and followed in my imagination by the store

detective.

We strode down the open corridors together in our

solitary fancy tasting artichokes, possessing every frozen

delicacy, and never passing the cashier.

Where are we going, Walt Whitman? The doors close in

an hour. Which way does your beard point tonight?

(I touch your book and dream of our odyssey in the

supermarket and feel absurd.)

Will we walk all night through solitary streets? The

trees add shade to shade, lights out in the houses, we’ll both be

lonely.

Will we stroll dreaming of the lost America of love

past blue automobiles in driveways, home to our silent cottage?

Ah, dear father, graybeard, lonely old courage-teacher,

what America did you have when Charon quit poling his ferry and

you got out on a smoking bank and stood watching the boat

disappear on the black waters of Lethe?

De a t h o f a

S a l e s m a n

D e a t h o f a
S a l e s m a n

A r t h u r M i l l e rA r t h u r M i l l e r

INTRODUCTION

Arthur Miller has emerged as one of the most successful and
enduring playwrights of the postwar era in America, no doubt
because his focusing on middle-class anxieties brought on by a
society that emphasizes the hollow values of material success has
struck such a responsive chord. The recurring theme of anxiety
and insecurity reflects much of Arthur Miller’s own past. Born the
son of a well-to-do Jewish manufacturer in New York City in 1915,
Miller had to experience the social disintegration of his family
when his father’s business failed during the Great Depression of
the 1930s. By taking on such odd jobs as waiter, truck driver, and
factory worker, Miller was able to complete his studies at the Uni-
versity of Michigan in 1938. These formative years gave Miller the
chance to come in close contact with those who suffered the most
from the Depression and instilled in him a strong sense of per-
sonal achievement necessary to rise above the situation. He began
writing plays in the 1930s, but it wasn’t until Death of a Salesman
was performed in 1949 that Miller established himself as a major
American dramatist.

Winning the Pulitzer Prize in 1949, Death of a Salesman has to
this day remained a classic. The play’s intellectual appeal lies in
Miller’s refusal to portray his characters as two-dimensional — his
refusal to involve himself in a one-sided polemic attack on capital-
ism. Even critics cannot agree as to whether Death of a Salesman
is to be categorized as social criticism, a tragedy, or simply a psy-
chological study. Of necessity, each person will have to draw his or
her own individual conclusions.

The fact that performances of Death of a Salesman have met
with acclaim throughout the world testifies to its universality: the
play’s conflicts and themes appear not to be uniquely American.

THE CHARACTERS

WILLY LOMAN
LINDA
BIFF
HAPPY
BERNARD
THE WOMAN
CHARLEY
UNCLE BEN
HOWARD WAGNER
JENNY
STANLEY
MISS FORSYTHE
LETTA

The action takes place in Willy Loman’s house and yard and in
various places he visits in the New York and Boston of today.

New York premiere February 10, 1949.

ACT ONE

A melody is heard, played upon a flute. It is small and fine, tell-
ing of grass and trees and the horizon. The curtain rises.

Before us is the Salesman’s house. We are aware of towering,
angular shapes behind it, surrounding it on all sides. Only the
blue light of the sky falls upon the house and forestage; the sur-
rounding area shows an angry glow of orange. As more light ap-
pears, we see a solid vault of apartment houses around the small,
fragile-seeming home. An air of the dream dings to the place, a
dream rising out of reality. The kitchen at center seems actual
enough, for there is a kitchen table with three chairs, and a refrig-
erator. But no other fixtures are seen. At the back of the kitchen
there is a draped entrance, which leads to the living room. To the
right of the kitchen, on a level raised two feet, is a bedroom fur-
nished only with a brass bedstead and a straight chair. On a shelf
over the bed a silver athletic trophy stands. A window opens onto
the apartment house at the side.

Behind the kitchen, on a level raised six and a half feet, is the
boys’ bedroom, at present barely visible. Two beds are dimly seen,
and at the back of the room a dormer window. (This bedroom is
above the unseen living room.) At the left a stairway curves up to it
from the kitchen.

The entire setting is wholly or, in some places, partially trans-
parent. The roof-line of the house is one-dimensional; under and
over it we see the apartment buildings. Before the house lies an
apron, curving beyond the forestage into the orchestra. This for-
ward area serves as the back yard as well as the locale of all Willy’s
imaginings and of his city scenes. Whenever the action is in the
present the actors observe the imaginary wall-lines, entering the
house only through its door at the left. But in the scenes of the past
these boundaries are broken, and characters enter or leave a room
by stepping »through« a wall onto the forestage.

From the right, Willy Loman, the Salesman, enters, carrying
two large sample cases. The flute plays on. He hears but is not
aware of it. He is past sixty years of age, dressed quietly. Even as
he crosses the stage to the doorway of the house, his exhaustion is
apparent. He unlocks the door, comes into the kitchen, and thank-
fully lets his burden down, feeling the soreness of his palms. A
word-sigh escapes his lips — it might be »Oh, boy, oh, boy.« He

closes the door, then carries his cases out into the living room,
through the draped kitchen doorway.

Linda, his wife, has stirred in her bed at the right. She gets out
and puts on a robe, listening. Most often jovial, she has developed
an iron repression of her exceptions to Willy’s behavior — she more
than loves him, she admires him, as though his mercurial nature,
his temper, his massive dreams and little cruelties, served her only
as sharp reminders of the turbulent longings within him, longings
which she shares but lacks the temperament to utter and follow to
their end.

LINDA (hearing Willy outside the bedroom, calls with some
trepidation): Willy!

WILLY: It’s all right. I came back.
LINDA: Why? What happened? (Slight pause.) Did something

happen, Willy?
WILLY: No, nothing happened.
LINDA: You didn’t smash the car, did you?
WILLY (with casual irritation): I said nothing happened. Didn’t

you hear me?
LINDA: Don’t you feel well?
WILLY: I’m tired to the death. (The flute has faded away. He sits

on the bed beside her, a little numb.) I couldn’t make it. I just
couldn’t make it, Linda.

LINDA (very carefully, delicately): Where were you all day? You
look terrible.

WILLY: I got as far as a little above Yonkers. I stopped for a cup
of coffee. Maybe it was the coffee.

LINDA: What?
WILLY (after a pause): I suddenly couldn’t drive any more. The

car kept going off onto the shoulder, y’know?
LINDA (helpfully): Oh. Maybe it was the steering again. I don’t

think Angelo knows the Studebaker.
WILLY: No, it’s me, it’s me. Suddenly I realize I’m goin’ sixty

miles an hour and I don’t remember the last five minutes. I’m
— I can’t seem to — keep my mind to it.

LINDA: Maybe it’s your glasses. You never went for your new
glasses.

WILLY: No, I see everything. I came back ten miles an hour. It
took me nearly four hours from Yonkers.

LINDA (resigned): Well, you’ll just have to take a rest, Willy, you
can’t continue this way.

WILLY: I just got back from Florida.
LINDA: But you didn’t rest your mind. Your mind is overactive,

and the mind is what counts, dear.
WILLY: I’ll start out in the morning. Maybe I’ll feel better in the

morning. (She is taking off his shoes.) These goddam arch sup-
ports are killing me.

LINDA: Take an aspirin. Should I get you an aspirin? It’ll soothe
you.

WILLY (with wonder): I was driving along, you understand? And I
was fine. I was even observing the scenery. You can imagine,
me looking at scenery, on the road every week of my life. But
it’s so beautiful up there, Linda, the trees are so thick, and the
sun is warm. I opened the windshield and just let the warm air
bathe over me. And then all of a sudden I’m goin’ off the road!
I’m tellin’ya, I absolutely forgot I was driving. If I’d’ve gone
the other way over the white line I might’ve killed somebody.
So I went on again — and five minutes later I’m dreamin’
again, and I nearly… (He presses two fingers against his eyes.) I
have such thoughts, I have such strange thoughts.

LINDA: Willy, dear. Talk to them again. There’s no reason why
you can’t work in New York.

WILLY: They don’t need me in New York. I’m the New England
man. I’m vital in New England.

LINDA: But you’re sixty years old. They can’t expect you to keep
travelling every week.

WILLY: I’ll have to send a wire to Portland. I’m supposed to see
Brown and Morrison tomorrow morning at ten o’clock to show
the line. Goddammit, I could sell them! (He starts putting on
his jacket.)

LINDA (taking the jacket from him): Why don’t you go down to
the place tomorrow and tell Howard you’ve simply got to work
in New York? You’re too accommodating, dear.

WILLY: If old man Wagner was alive I’d a been in charge of New
York now! That man was a prince, he was a masterful man.

But that boy of his, that Howard, he don’t appreciate. When I
went north the first time, the Wagner Company didn’t know
where New England was!

LINDA: Why don’t you tell those things to Howard, dear?
WILLY (encouraged): I will, I definitely will. Is there any cheese?
LINDA: I’ll make you a sandwich.
WILLY: No, go to sleep. I’ll take some milk. I’ll be up right away.

The boys in?
LINDA: They’re sleeping. Happy took Biff on a date tonight.
WILLY (interested): That so?
LINDA: It was so nice to see them shaving together, one behind

the other, in the bathroom. And going out together. You no-
tice? The whole house smells of shaving lotion.

WILLY: Figure it out. Work a lifetime to pay off a house. You
finally own it, and there’s nobody to live in it.

LINDA: Well, dear, life is a casting off. It’s always that way.
WILLY: No, no, some people- some people accomplish something.

Did Biff say anything after I went this morning?
LINDA: You shouldn’t have criticised him, Willy, especially after

he just got off the train. You mustn’t lose your temper with
him.

WILLY: When the hell did I lose my temper? I simply asked him if
he was making any money. Is that a criticism?

LINDA: But, dear, how could he make any money?
WILLY (worried and angered): There’s such an undercurrent in

him. He became a moody man. Did he apologize when I left this
morning?

LINDA: He was crestfallen, Willy. You know how he admires you.
I think if he finds himself, then you’ll both be happier and not
fight any more.

WILLY: How can he find himself on a farm? Is that a life? A farm-
hand? In the beginning, when he was young, I thought, well, a
young man, it’s good for him to tramp around, take a lot of dif-
ferent jobs. But it’s more than ten years now and he has yet to
make thirty-five dollars a week!

LINDA: He’s finding himself, Willy.
WILLY: Not finding yourself at the age of thirty-four is a disgrace!

LINDA: Shh!
WILLY: The trouble is he’s lazy, goddammit!
LINDA: Willy, please!
WILLY: Biff is a lazy bum!
LINDA: They’re sleeping. Get something to eat. Go on down.
WILLY: Why did he come home? I would like to know what

brought him home.
LINDA: I don’t know. I think he’s still lost, Willy. I think he’s

very lost.
WILLY: Biff Loman is lost. In the greatest country in the world a

young man with such — personal attractiveness, gets lost. And
such a hard worker. There’s one thing about Biff — he’s not
lazy.

LINDA: Never.
WILLY (with pity and resolve): I’ll see him in the morning; I’ll

have a nice talk with him. I’ll get him a job selling. He could be
big in no time. My God! Remember how they used to follow
him around in high school? When he smiled at one of them
their faces lit up. When he walked down the street… (He loses
himself in reminiscences.)

LINDA (trying to bring him out of it): Willy, dear, I got a new kind
of American-type cheese today. It’s whipped.

WILLY: Why do you get American when I like Swiss?
LINDA: I just thought you’d like a change…
WILLY: I don’t want a change! I want Swiss cheese. Why am I

always being contradicted?
LINDA (with a covering laugh): I thought it would be a surprise.
WILLY: Why don’t you open a window in here, for God’s sake?
LINDA (with infinite patience): They’re all open, dear.
WILLY: The way they boxed us in here. Bricks and windows, win-

dows and bricks.
LINDA: We should’ve bought the land next door.
WILLY: The street is lined with cars. There’s not a breath of fresh

air in the neighborhood. The grass don’t grow any more, you
can’t raise a carrot in the back yard. They should’ve had a law
against apartment houses. Remember those two beautiful elm

trees out there? When I and Biff hung the swing between
them?

LINDA: Yeah, like being a million miles from the city.
WILLY: They should’ve arrested the builder for cutting those

down. They massacred the neighbourhood. (Lost.) More and
more I think of those days, Linda. This time of year it was lilac
and wisteria. And then the peonies would come out, and the
daffodils. What fragrance in this room!

LINDA: Well, after all, people had to move somewhere.
WILLY: No, there’s more people now.
LINDA: I don’t think there’s more people. I think
WILLY: There’s more people! That’s what’s ruining this country!

Population is getting out of control. The competition is mad-
dening! Smell the stink from that apartment house! And an-
other one on the other side… How can they whip cheese?

(On Willy’s last line, Biff and Happy raise themselves up in
their beds, listening.)

LINDA: Go down, try it. And be quiet.
WILLY (turning to Linda, guiltily): You’re not worried about me,

are you, sweetheart?
BIFF: What’s the matter?
HAPPY: Listen!
LINDA: You’ve got too much on the ball to worry about.
WILLY: You’re my foundation and my support, Linda.
LINDA: Just try to relax, dear. You make mountains out of mole-

hills.
WILLY: I won’t fight with him any more. If he wants to go back to

Texas, let him go.
LINDA: He’ll find his way.
WILLY: Sure. Certain men just don’t get started till later in life.

Like Thomas Edison; I think. Or B. F. Goodrich. One of them
was deaf. (He starts for the bedroom doorway.) I’ll put my
money on Biff.

LINDA: And Willy — if it’s warm Sunday we’ll drive in the coun-
try. And we’ll open the windshield, and take lunch.

WILLY: No, the windshields don’t open on the new cars.

LINDA: But you opened it today.
WILLY: Me? I didn’t. (He stops.) Now isn’t that peculiar! Isn’t

that a remarkable… (He breaks off in amazement and fright as
the flute is heard distantly.)

LINDA: What, darling?
WILLY: That is the most remarkable thing.
LINDA: What, dear?
WILLY: I was thinking of the Chevvy. (Slight pause.) Nineteen

twenty-eight … when I had that red Chevvy… (Breaks off.) That
funny? I coulda sworn I was driving that Chevvy today.

LINDA: Well, that’s nothing. Something must’ve reminded you.
WILLY: Remarkable. Ts. Remember those days? The way Biff

used to simonize that car? The dealer refused to believe there
was eighty thousand miles on it. (He shakes his head.) Heh! (To
Linda.) Close your eyes, I’ll be right up. (He walks out of the
bedroom.)

HAPPY (to Biff): Jesus, maybe he smashed up the car again!
LINDA (calling after Willy): Be careful on the stairs, dear! The

cheese is on the middle shelf. (She turns, goes over to the bed,
takes his jacket, and goes out of the bedroom.)

(Light has risen on the boys’ room. Unseen, Willy is heard talk-
ing to himself, »eighty thousand miles,« and a little laugh. Biff
gets out of bed, comes downstage a bit, and stands attentively. Biff
is two years older than his brother Happy, well built, but in these
days bears a worn air and seems less self-assured. He has suc-
ceeded less, and his dreams are stronger and less acceptable than
Happy’s. Happy is tall, powerfully made. Sexuality is like a visible
color on him, or a scent that many women have discovered. He, like
his brother, is lost, but in a different way, for he has never allowed
himself to turn his face toward defeat and is thus more confused
and hard-skinned, although seemingly more content.)

HAPPY (getting out of bed): He’s going to get his license taken
away if he keeps that up. I’m getting nervous about him,
y’know, Biff?

BIFF: His eyes are going.
HAPPY: I’ve driven with him. He sees all right. He just doesn’t

keep his mind on it. I drove into the city with him last week.

He stops at a green light and then it turns red and he goes. (He
laughs.)

BIFF: Maybe he’s color-blind.
HAPPY: Pop? Why he’s got the finest eye for color in the busi-

ness. You know that.
BIFF (sitting down on his bed): I’m going to sleep.
HAPPY: You’re not still sour on Dad, are you, Biff?
BIFF: He’s all right, I guess.
WILLY (underneath them, in the living room): Yes, sir, eighty

thousand miles — eighty-two thousand!
BIFF: You smoking?
HAPPY (holding out a pack of cigarettes): Want one?
BIFF: (taking a cigarette): I can never sleep when I smell it.
WILLY: What a simonizing job, heh?
HAPPY (with deep sentiment): Funny, Biff, y’know? Us sleeping in

here again? The old beds. (He pats his bed affectionately.) All
the talk that went across those two beds, huh? Our whole lives.

BIFF: Yeah. Lotta dreams and plans.
HAPPY (with a deep and masculine laugh): About five hundred

women would like to know what was said in this room. (They
share a soft laugh.)

BIFF: Remember that big Betsy something — what the hell was
her name — over on Bushwick Avenue?

HAPPY (combing his hair): With the collie dog!
BIFF: That’s the one. I got you in there, remember? HAPPY:

Yeah, that was my first time — I think. Boy, there was a pig.
(They laugh, almost crudely.) You taught me everything I know
about women. Don’t forget that.

BIFF: I bet you forgot how bashful you used to be. Especially with
girls.

HAPPY: Oh, I still am, Biff.
BIFF: Oh, go on.
HAPPY: I just control it, that’s all. I think I got less bashful and

you got more so. What happened, Biff? Where’s the old humor,
the old confidence? (He shakes Biffs knee. Biff gets up and
moves restlessly about the room.) What’s the matter?

BIFF: Why does Dad mock me all the time?
HAPPY: He’s not mocking you, he…
BIFF: Everything I say there’s a twist of mockery on his face. I

can’t get near him.
HAPPY: He just wants you to make good, that’s all. I wanted to

talk to you about Dad for a long time, Biff. Something’s —
happening to him. He — talks to himself.

BIFF: I noticed that this morning. But he always mumbled.
HAPPY: But not so noticeable. It got so embarrassing I sent him

to Florida. And you know something? Most of the time he’s
talking to you.

BIFF: What’s he say about me?
HAPPY: I can’t make it out.
BIFF: What’s he say about me?
HAPPY: I think the fact that you’re not settled, that you’re still

kind of up in the air…
BIFF: There’s one or two other things depressing him, Happy.
HAPPY: What do you mean?
BIFF: Never mind. Just don’t lay it all to me.
HAPPY: But I think if you just got started — I mean — is there

any future for you out there?
BIFF: I tell ya, Hap, I don’t know what the future is. I don’t know

— what I’m supposed to want.
HAPPY: What do you mean?
BIFF: Well, I spent six or seven years after high school trying to

work myself up. Shipping clerk, salesman, business of one kind
or another. And it’s a measly manner of existence. To get on
that subway on the hot mornings in summer. To devote your
whole life to keeping stock, or making phone calls, or selling or
buying. To suffer fifty weeks of the year for the sake of a two-
week vacation, when all you really desire is to be outdoors,
with your shirt off. And always to have to get ahead of the next
fella. And still — that’s how you build a future.

HAPPY: Well, you really enjoy it on a farm? Are you content out
there?

BIFF (with rising agitation): Hap, I’ve had twenty or thirty differ-

ent kinds of jobs since I left home before the war, and it always
turns out the same. I just realized it lately. In Nebraska when I
herded cattle, and the Dakotas, and Arizona, and now in Texas.
It’s why I came home now, I guess, because I realized it. This
farm I work on, it’s spring there now, see? And they’ve got
about fifteen new colts. There’s nothing more inspiring or —
beautiful than the sight of a mare and a new colt. And it’s cool
there now, see? Texas is cool now, and it’s spring. And when-
ever spring comes to where I am, I suddenly get the feeling, my
God, I’m not gettin’ anywhere! What the hell am I doing, play-
ing around with horses, twenty-eight dollars a week! I’m
thirty-four years old, I oughta be makin’ my future. That’s
when I come running home. And now, I get here, and I don’t
know what to do with myself. (After a pause.) I’ve always made
a point of not wasting my life, and everytime I come back here
I know that all I’ve done is to waste my life.

HAPPY: You’re a poet, you know that, Biff? You’re a — you’re an
idealist!

BIFF: No, I’m mixed up very bad. Maybe I oughta get married.
Maybe I oughta get stuck into something. Maybe that’s my
trouble. I’m like a boy. I’m not married, I’m not in business, I
just — I’m like a boy. Are you content, Hap? You’re a success,
aren’t you? Are you content?

HAPPY: Hell, no!
BIFF: Why? You’re making money, aren’t you?
HAPPY (moving about with energy, expressiveness): All I can do

now is wait for the merchandise manager to die. And suppose I
get to be merchandise manager? He’s a good friend of mine,
and he just built a terrific estate on Long Island. And he lived
there about two months and sold it, and now he’s building an-
other one. He can’t enjoy it once it’s finished. And I know
that’s just what I would do. I don’t know what the hell I’m
workin’ for. Sometimes I sit in my apartment — all alone. And
I think of the rent I’m paying. And it’s crazy. But then, it’s
what I always wanted. My own apartment, a car, and plenty of
women. And still, goddammit, I’m lonely.

BIFF (with enthusiasm): Listen, why don’t you come out West
with me?

HAPPY: You and I, heh?

BIFF: Sure, maybe we could buy a ranch. Raise cattle, use our
muscles. Men built like we are should be working out in the
open.

HAPPY (avidly): The Loman Brothers, heh?
BIFF (with vast affection): Sure, we’d be known all over the coun-

ties!
HAPPY (enthralled): That’s what I dream about, Biff. Sometimes

I want to just rip my clothes off in the middle of the store and
outbox that goddam merchandise manager. I mean I can out-
box, outrun, and outlift anybody in that store, and I have to
take orders from those common, petty sons-of-bitches till I
can’t stand it any more.

BIFF: I’m tellin’ you, kid, if you were with me I’d be happy out
there.

HAPPY (enthused): See, Biff, everybody around me is so false that
I’m constantly lowering my ideals…

BIFF: Baby, together we’d stand up for one another, we’d have
someone to trust.

HAPPY: If I were around you…
BIFF: Hap, the trouble is we weren’t brought up to grub for

money. I don’t know how to do it.
HAPPY: Neither can I!
BIFF: Then let’s go!
HAPPY: The only thing is — what can you make out there?
BIFF: But look at your friend. Builds an estate and then hasn’t

the peace of mind to live in it.
HAPPY: Yeah, but when he walks into the store the waves part in

front of him. That’s fifty-two thousand dollars a year coming
through the revolving door, and I got more in my pinky finger
than he’s got in his head.

BIFF: Yeah, but you just said…
HAPPY: I gotta show some of those pompous, self-important

executives over there that Hap Loman can make the grade. I
want to walk into the store the way he walks in. Then I’ll go
with you, Biff. We’ll be together yet, I swear. But take those
two we had tonight. Now weren’t they gorgeous creatures?

BIFF: Yeah, yeah, most gorgeous I’ve had in years.

HAPPY: I get that any time I want, Biff. Whenever I feel dis-
gusted. The only trouble is, it gets like bowling or something. I
just keep knockin’ them over and it doesn’t mean anything.
You still run around a lot?

BIFF: Naa. I’d like to find a girl — steady, somebody with sub-
stance.

HAPPY: That’s what I long for.
BIFF: Go on! You’d never come home.
HAPPY: I would! Somebody with character, with resistance! Like

Mom, y’know? You’re gonna call me a bastard when I tell you
this. That girl Charlotte I was with tonight is engaged to be
married in five weeks. (He tries on his new hat.)

BIFF: No kiddin’!
HAPPY: Sure, the guy’s in line for the vice-presidency of the

store. I don’t know what gets into me, maybe I just have an
overdeveloped sense of competition or something, but I went
and ruined her, and furthermore I can’t get rid of her. And he’s
the third executive I’ve done that to. Isn’t that a crummy char-
acteristic? And to top it all, I go to their weddings! (Indig-
nantly, but laughing.) Like I’m not supposed to take bribes.
Manufacturers offer me a hundred-dollar bill now and then to
throw an order their way. You know how honest I am, but it’s
like this girl, see. I hate myself for it. Because I don’t want the
girl, and still, I take it and — I love it!

BIFF: Let’s go to sleep.
HAPPY: I guess we didn’t settle anything, heh?
BIFF: I just got one idea that I think I’m going to try.
HAPPY: What’s that?
BIFF: Remember Bill Oliver?
HAPPY: Sure, Oliver is very big now. You want to work for him

again?
BIFF: No, but when I quit he said something to me. He put his

arm on my shoulder, and he said, »Biff, if you ever need any-
thing, come to me.«

HAPPY: I remember that. That sounds good.
BIFF: I think I’ll go to see him. If I could get ten thousand or even

seven or eight thousand dollars I could buy a beautiful ranch.

HAPPY: I bet he’d back you. Cause he thought highly of you, Biff.
I mean, they all do. You’re well liked, Biff. That’s why I say to
come back here, and we both have the apartment. And I’m tel-
lin’ you, Biff, any babe you want…

BIFF: No, with a ranch I could do the work I like and still be
something. I just wonder though. I wonder if Oliver still thinks
I stole that carton of basketballs.

HAPPY: Oh, he probably forgot that long ago. It’s almost ten
years. You’re too sensitive. Anyway, he didn’t really fire you.

BIFF: Well, I think he was going to. I think that’s why I quit. I
was never sure whether he knew or not. I know he thought the
world of me, though. I was the only one he’d let lock up the
place.

WILLY (below): You gonna wash the engine, Biff?
HAPPY: Shh!

(Biff looks at Happy, who is gazing down, listening. Willy is
mumbling in the parlor.)

HAPPY: You hear that? (They listen. Willy laughs warmly.)
BIFF (growing angry): Doesn’t he know Mom can hear that?
WILLY: Don’t get your sweater dirty, Biff! (A look of pain crosses

Biffs face.)
HAPPY: Isn’t that terrible? Don’t leave again, will you? You’ll

find a job here. You gotta stick around. I don’t know what to do
about him, it’s getting embarrassing.

WILLY: What a simonizing job!
BIFF: Mom’s hearing that!
WILLY: No kiddin’, Biff, you got a date? Wonderful!
HAPPY: Go on to sleep. But talk to him in the morning, will you?
BIFF (reluctantly getting into bed): With her in the house.

Brother!
HAPPY (getting into bed): I wish you’d have a good talk with him.

(The light of their room begins to fade.)

BIFF (to himself in bed): That selfish, stupid…
HAPPY: Sh… Sleep, Biff.

(Their light is out. Well before they have finished speaking,
Willy’s form is dimly seen below in the darkened kitchen. He opens
the refrigerator, searches in there, and takes out a bottle of milk.
The apartment houses are fading out, and the entire house and
surroundings become covered with leaves. Music insinuates itself
as the leaves appear.)

WILLY: Just wanna be careful with those girls, Biff, that’s all.
Don’t make any promises. No promises of any kind. Because a
girl, y’know, they always believe what you tell ‘em, and you’re
very young, Biff, you’re too young to be talking seriously to
girls.

(Light rises on the kitchen. Willy, talking, shuts the refrigerator
door and comes downstage to the kitchen table. He pours milk into
a glass. He is totally immersed in himself, smiling faintly.)

WILLY: Too young entirely, Biff. You want to watch your school-
ing first. Then when you’re all set, there’ll be plenty of girls for
a boy like you. (He smiles broadly at a kitchen chair.) That so?
The girls pay for you? (He laughs) Boy, you must really be
makin’ a hit.

(Willy is gradually addressing — physically — a point offstage,
speaking through the wall of the kitchen, and his voice has been
rising in volume to that of a normal conversation.)

WILLY: I been wondering why you polish the car so careful. Ha!
Don’t leave the hubcaps, boys. Get the chamois to the hubcaps.
Happy, use newspaper on the windows, it’s the easiest thing.
Show him how to do it Biff! You see, Happy? Pad it up, use it
like a pad. That’s it, that’s it, good work. You’re doin’ all right,
Hap. (He pauses, then nods in approbation for a few seconds,
then looks upward.) Biff, first thing we gotta do when we get
time is clip that big branch over the house. Afraid it’s gonna
fall in a storm and hit the roof. Tell you what. We get a rope
and sling her around, and then we climb up there with a couple
of saws and take her down. Soon as you finish the car, boys, I
wanna see ya. I got a surprise for you, boys.

BIFF (offstage): Whatta ya got, Dad?
WILLY: No, you finish first. Never leave a job till you’re finished

— remember that. (Looking toward the »big trees«.) Biff, up in

Albany I saw a beautiful hammock. I think I’ll buy it next trip,
and we’ll hang it right between those two elms. Wouldn’t that
be something? Just swingin’ there under those branches. Boy,
that would be…

(Young Biff and Young Happy appear from the direction Willy
was addressing. Happy carries rags and a pail of water. Biff, wear-
ing a sweater with a block »S«, carries a football.)

BIFF (pointing in the direction of the car offstage): How’s that,
Pop, professional?

WILLY: Terrific. Terrific job, boys. Good work, Biff.
HAPPY: Where’s the surprise, Pop?
WILLY: In the back seat of the car.
HAPPY: Boy! (He runs off.)
BIFF: What is it, Dad? Tell me, what’d you buy?
WILLY (laughing, cuffs him): Never mind, something I want you

to have.
BIFF (turns and starts off): What is it, Hap?
HAPPY (offstage): It’s a punching bag!
BIFF: Oh, Pop!
WILLY: It’s got Gene Tunney’s signature on it! (Happy runs on-

stage with a punching bag.)
BIFF: Gee, how’d you know we wanted a punching bag?
WILLY: Well, it’s the finest thing for the timing.
HAPPY (lies down on his back and pedals with his feet): I’m losing

weight, you notice, Pop?
WILLY (to Happy): Jumping rope is good too.
BIFF: Did you see the new football I got?
WILLY (examining the ball): Where’d you get a new ball?
BIFF: The coach told me to practice my passing.
WILLY: That so? And he gave you the ball, heh? BIFF: Well, I

borrowed it from the locker room. (He laughs confidentially.)
WILLY (laughing with him at the theft): I want you to return that.
HAPPY: I told you he wouldn’t like it!
BIFF (angrily): Well, I’m bringing it back!
WILLY (stopping the incipient argument, to Happy): Sure, he’s

gotta practice with a regulation ball, doesn’t he? (To Biff.)
Coach’ll probably congratulate you on your initiative!

BIFF: Oh, he keeps congratulating my initiative all the time, Pop.
WILLY: That’s because he likes you. If somebody else took that

ball there’d be an uproar. So what’s the report, boys, what’s
the report?

BIFF: Where’d you go this time, Dad? Gee we were lonesome for
you.

WILLY (pleased, puts an arm around each boy and they come
down to the apron): Lonesome, heh?

BIFF: Missed you every minute.
WILLY: Don’t say? Tell you a secret, boys. Don’t breathe it to a

soul. Someday I’ll have my own business, and I’ll never have to
leave home any more.

HAPPY: Like Uncle Charley, heh?
WILLY: Bigger than Uncle Charley! Because Charley is not —

liked. He’s liked, but he’s not — well liked.
BIFF: Where’d you go this time, Dad?
WILLY: Well, I got on the road, and I went north to

Providence.

Met the Mayor.
BIFF: The Mayor of Providence!
WILLY: He was sitting in the hotel lobby.
BIFF: What’d he say?
WILLY: He said, »Morning!« And I said, »You got a fine city here,

Mayor.« And then he had coffee with me. And then I went to
Waterbury. Waterbury is a fine city. Big clock city, the famous
Waterbury clock. Sold a nice bill there. And then Boston —
Boston is the cradle of the Revolution. A fine city. And a couple
of other towns in Mass., and on to Portland and Bangor and
straight home!

BIFF: Gee, I’d love to go with you sometime, Dad.
WILLY: Soon as summer comes.
HAPPY: Promise?
WILLY: You and Hap and I, and I’ll show you all the towns.

America is full of beautiful towns and fine, upstanding people.
And they know me, boys, they know me up and down New
England. The finest people. And when I bring you fellas up,

there’ll be open sesame for all of us, ‘cause one thing, boys: I
have friends. I can park my car in any street in New England,
and the cops protect it like their own. This summer, heh?

BIFF AND HAPPY (together): Yeah! You bet!
WILLY: We’ll take our bathing suits.
HAPPY: We’ll carry your bags, Pop!
WILLY: Oh, won’t that be something! Me comin’ into the Boston

stores with you boys carryin’ my bags. What a sensation!

(Biff is prancing around, practicing passing the ball.)

WILLY: You nervous, Biff, about the game?
BIFF: Not if you’re gonna be there.
WILLY: What do they say about you in school, now that they

made you captain?
HAPPY: There’s a crowd of girls behind him everytime the classes

change.
BIFF (taking Willy’s hand): This Saturday, Pop, this Saturday —

just for you, I’m going to break through for a touchdown.
HAPPY: You’re supposed to pass.
BIFF: I’m takin’ one play for Pop. You watch me, Pop, and when I

take off my helmet, that means I’m breakin’ out. Then you
watch me crash through that line!

WILLY (kisses Biff): Oh, wait’ll I tell this in Boston!

(Bernard enters in knickers. He is younger than Biff, earnest
and loyal, a worried boy).

BERNARD: Biff, where are you? You’re supposed to study with
me today.

WILLY: Hey, looka Bernard. What’re you lookin’ so anemic about,
Bernard?

BERNARD: He’s gotta study, Uncle Willy. He’s got Regents next
week.

HAPPY (tauntingly, spinning Bernard around): Let’s box, Ber-
nard!

BERNARD: Biff! (He gets away from Happy.) Listen, Biff, I heard
Mr. Birnbaum say that if you don’t start studyin’ math he’s
gonna flunk you, and you won’t graduate. I heard him!

WILLY: You better study with him, Biff. Go ahead now.
BERNARD: I heard him!
BIFF: Oh, Pop, you didn’t see my sneakers! (He holds up a foot for

Willy to look at.)
WILLY: Hey, that’s a beautiful job of printing!
BERNARD (wiping his glasses): Just because he printed Univer-

sity of Virginia on his sneakers doesn’t mean they’ve got to
graduate him. Uncle Willy!

WILLY (angrily): What’re you talking about? With scholarships to
three universities they’re gonna flunk him?

BERNARD: But I heard Mr. Birnbaum say…
WILLY: Don’t be a pest, Bernard! (To his boys.) What an anemic!
BERNARD: Okay, I’m waiting for you in my house, Biff.

(Bernard goes off. The Lomans laugh.)

WILLY: Bernard is not well liked, is he?
BIFF: He’s liked, but he’s not well liked.
HAPPY: That’s right, Pop.
WILLY: That’s just what I mean. Bernard can get the best marks

in school, y’understand, but when he gets out in the business
world, y’understand, you are going to be five times ahead of
him. That’s why I thank Almighty God you’re both built like
Adonises. Because the man who makes an appearance in the
business world, the man who creates personal interest, is the
man who gets ahead. Be liked and you will never want. You
take me, for instance. I never have to wait in line to see a
buyer. »Willy Loman is here!« That’s all they have to know,
and I go right through.

BIFF: Did you knock them dead. Pop?
WILLY: Knocked ‘em cold in Providence, slaughtered ‘em in Bos-

ton.
HAPPY (on his back, pedaling again): I’m losing weight, you no-

tice, Pop?

(Linda enters as of old, a ribbon in her hair, carrying a basket
of washing.)

LINDA (with youthful energy): Hello, dear!

WILLY: Sweetheart!
LINDA: How’d the Chevvy run?
WILLY: Chevrolet, Linda, is the greatest car ever built. (To the

boys.) Since when do you let your mother carry wash up the
stairs?

BIFF: Grab hold there, boy!
HAPPY: Where to, Mom?
LINDA: Hang them up on the line. And you better go down to

your friends, Biff. The cellar is full of boys. They don’t know
what to do with themselves.

BIFF: Ah, when Pop comes home they can wait!
WILLY (laughs appreciatively): You better go down and tell them

what to do, Biff.
BIFF: I think I’ll have them sweep out the furnace room.
WILLY: Good work, Biff.
BIFF (goes through wall-line of kitchen to doorway at back and

calls down): Fellas! Everybody sweep out the furnace room! I’ll
be right down!

VOICES: All right! Okay, Biff.
BIFF: George and Sam and Frank, come out back! We’re hangin’

up the wash! Come on, Hap, on the double! (He and Happy
carry out the basket.)

LINDA: The way they obey him!
WILLY: Well, that’s training, the training. I’m tellin’ you, I was

sellin’ thousands and thousands, but I had to come home.
LINDA: Oh, the whole block’ll be at that game. Did you sell any-

thing?
WILLY: I did five hundred gross in Providence and seven hundred

gross in Boston.
LINDA: No! Wait a minute, I’ve got a pencil. (She pulls pencil and

paper out of her apron pocket.) That makes your commission…
Two hundred… my God! Two hundred and twelve dollars!

WILLY: Well, I didn’t figure it yet, but…
LINDA: How much did you do?
WILLY: Well, I — I did — about a hundred and eighty gross in

Providence.

Well, no — it came to — roughly two hundred gross on the whole
trip.

LINDA (without hesitation): Two hundred gross. That’s… (She
figures.)

WILLY: The trouble was that three of the stores were half-closed
for inventory in Boston. Otherwise I woulda broke records.

LINDA: Well, it makes seventy dollars and some pennies. That’s
very good.

WILLY: What do we owe?
LINDA: Well, on the first there’s sixteen dollars on the refrigera-

tor
WILLY: Why sixteen?
LINDA: Well, the fan belt broke, so it was a dollar eighty.
WILLY: But it’s brand new.
LINDA: Well, the man said that’s the way it is. Till they work

themselves in, y’know.

(They move through the wall-line into the kitchen.)

WILLY: I hope we didn’t get stuck on that machine.
LINDA: They got the biggest ads of any of them!
WILLY: I know, it’s a fine machine. What else?
LINDA: Well, there’s nine-sixty for the washing machine. And for

the vacuum cleaner there’s three and a half due on the fif-
teenth. Then the roof, you got twenty-one dollars remaining.

WILLY: It don’t leak, does it?
LINDA: No, they did a wonderful job. Then you owe Frank for the

carburetor.
WILLY: I’m not going to pay that man! That goddam Chevrolet,

they ought to prohibit the manufacture oft hat car!
LINDA: Well, you owe him three and a half. And odds and ends,

comes to around a hundred and twenty dollars by the fifteenth.
WILLY: A hundred and twenty dollars! My God, if business don’t

pick up I don’t know what I’m gonna do!
LINDA: Well, next week you’ll do better.
WILLY: Oh, I’ll knock ‘em dead next week. I’ll go to Hartford. I’m

very well liked in Hartford. You know, the trouble is, Linda,

people don’t seem to take to me.

(They move onto the forestage.)

LINDA: Oh, don’t be foolish.
WILLY: I know it when I walk in. They seem to laugh at me.
LINDA: Why? Why would they laugh at you? Don’t talk that way,

Willy.

(Willy moves to the edge of the stage. Linda goes into the kitchen
and starts to dam stockings.)

WILLY: I don’t know the reason for it, but they just pass me by.
I’m not noticed.

LINDA: But you’re doing wonderful, dear. You’re making seventy
to a hundred dollars a week.

WILLY: But I gotta be at it ten, twelve hours a day. Other men —
I don’t know — they do it easier. I don’t know why — I can’t
stop myself — I talk too much. A man oughta come in with a
few words. One thing about Charley. He’s a man of few words,
and they respect him.

LINDA: You don’t talk too much, you’re just lively.
WILLY (smiling): Well, I figure, what the hell, life is short, a cou-

ple of jokes. (To himself.) I joke too much (The smile goes.)
LINDA: Why? You’re…
WILLY: I’m fat. I’m very — foolish to look at, Linda. I didn’t tell

you, but Christmas time I happened to be calling on F. H.
Stewarts, and a salesman I know, as I was going in to see the
buyer I heard him say something about — walrus. And I — I
cracked him right across the face. I won’t take that. I simply
will not take that. But they do laugh at me. I know that.

LINDA: Darling…
WILLY: I gotta overcome it. I know I gotta overcome it. I’m not

dressing to advantage, maybe.
LINDA: Willy, darling, you’re the handsomest man in the world…
WILLY: Oh, no, Linda.
LINDA: To me you are. (Slight pause.) The handsomest.

(From the darkness is heard the laughter of a woman. Willy
doesn’t turn to it, but it continues through Linda’s lines.)

LINDA: And the boys, Willy. Few men are idolized by their chil-
dren the way you are.

(Music is heard as behind a scrim, to the left of the house; The
Woman, dimly seen, is dressing.)

WILLY (with great feeling): You’re the best there is, Linda, you’re
a pal, you know that? On the road — on the road I want to
grab you sometimes and just kiss the life outa you.

(The laughter is loud now, and he moves into a brightening
area at the left, where The Woman has come from behind the scrim
and is standing, putting on her hat, looking into a »mirror« and
laughing.)

WILLY: Cause I get so lonely — especially when business is bad
and there’s nobody to talk to. I get the feeling that I’ll never
sell anything again, that I won’t make a living for you, or a
business, a business for the boys. (He talks through The
Woman’s subsiding laughter; The Woman primps at the »mir-
ror«.) There’s so much I want to make for…

THE WOMAN: Me? You didn’t make me, Willy. I picked you.
WILLY (pleased): You picked me?
THE WOMAN: (who is quite proper-looking, Willy’s age): I did.

I’ve been sitting at that desk watching all the salesmen go by,
day in, day out. But you’ve got such a sense of humor, and we
do have such a good time together, don’t we?

WILLY: Sure, sure. (He takes her in his arms.) Why do you have
to go now?

THE WOMAN: It’s two o’clock…
WILLY: No, come on in! (He pulls her.)
THE WOMAN:… my sisters’ll be scandalized. When’ll you be

back?
WILLY: Oh, two weeks about. Will you come up again?
THE WOMAN: Sure thing. You do make me laugh. It’s good for

me. (She squeezes his arm, kisses him.) And I think you’re a
wonderful man.

WILLY: You picked me, heh?
THE WOMAN: Sure. Because you’re so sweet. And such a kidder.

WILLY: Well, I’ll see you next time I’m in Boston.
THE WOMAN: I’ll put you right through to the buyers.
WILLY (slapping her bottom): Right. Well, bottoms up!
THE WOMAN (slaps him gently and laughs): You just kill me,

Willy. (He suddenly grabs her and kisses her roughly.) You kill
me. And thanks for the stockings. I love a lot of stockings. Well,
good night.

WILLY: Good night. And keep your pores open!
THE WOMAN: Oh, Willy!

(The Woman bursts out laughing, and Linda’s laughter blends
in. The Woman disappears into the dark. Now the area at the
kitchen table brightens. Linda is sitting where she was at the
kitchen table, but now is mending a pair of her silk stockings.)

LINDA: You are, Willy. The handsomest man. You’ve got no rea-
son to feel that…

WILLY (corning out of The Woman’s dimming area and going
over to Linda): I’ll make it all up to you, Linda, I’ll…

LINDA: There’s nothing to make up, dear. You’re doing fine, bet-
ter than…

WILLY (noticing her mending): What’s that?
LINDA: Just mending my stockings. They’re so expensive…
WILLY (angrily, taking them from her): I won’t have you mending

stockings in this house! Now throw them out! (Linda puts the
stockings in her pocket.)

BERNARD (entering on the run): Where is he? If he doesn’t study!
WILLY (moving to the forestage, with great agitation): You’ll give

him the answers!
BERNARD: I do, but I can’t on a Regents! That’s a state exam!

They’re liable to arrest me!
WILLY: Where is he? I’ll whip him, I’ll whip him!
LINDA: And he’d better give back that football, Willy, it’s not

nice.
WILLY: Biff! Where is he? Why is he taking everything?
LINDA: He’s too rough with the girls, Willy. All the mothers are

afraid of him!

WILLY: I’ll whip him!
BERNARD: He’s driving the car without a license!

(The Woman’s laugh is heard.)

WILLY: Shut up!
LINDA: All the mothers…
WILLY: Shut up!
BERNARD (backing quietly away and out): Mr. Birnbaum says

he’s stuck up. WILLY: Get outa here!
BERNARD: If he doesn’t buckle down he’ll flunk math! (He goes

off.)
LINDA: He’s right, Willy, you’ve gotta…
WILLY (exploding at her): There’s nothing the matter with him!

You want him to be a worm like Bernard? He’s got spirit, per-
sonality (As he speaks, Linda, almost in tears, exits into the liv-
ing room. Willy is alone in the kitchen, wilting and staring. The
leaves are gone. It is night again, and the apartment houses
look down from behind.)

WILLY: Loaded with it. Loaded! What is he stealing? He’s giving
it back, isn’t he? Why is he stealing? What did I tell him? I
never in my life told him anything but decent things.

(Happy in pajamas has come down the stairs; Willy suddenly
becomes aware of Happy’s presence.)

HAPPY: Let’s go now, come on.
WILLY (sitting down at the kitchen table): Huh! Why did she have

to wax the floors herself? Everytime she waxes the floors she
keels over. She knows that!

HAPPY: Shh! Take it easy. What brought you back tonight?
WILLY: I got an awful scare. Nearly hit a kid in Yonkers. God!

Why didn’t I go to Alaska with my brother Ben that time! Ben!
That man was a genius, that man was success incarnate! What
a mistake! He begged me to go.

HAPPY: Well, there’s no use in…
WILLY: You guys! There was a man started with the clothes on

his back and ended up with diamond mines!
HAPPY: Boy, someday I’d like to know how he did it.

WILLY: What’s the mystery? The man knew what he wanted and
went out and got it! Walked into a jungle, and comes out, the
age of twenty-one, and he’s rich! The world is an oyster, but
you don’t crack it open on a mattress!

HAPPY: Pop, I told you I’m gonna retire you for life.
WILLY: You’ll retire me for life on seventy goddam dollars a

week? And your women and your car and your apartment, and
you’ll retire me for life! Christ’s sake, I couldn’t get past
Yonkers today! Where are you guys, where are you? The woods
are burning! I can’t drive a car!

(Charley has appeared in the doorway. He is a large man, slow
of speech, laconic, immovable. In all he says, despite what he says,
there is pity, and, now, trepidation. He has a robe over pajamas,
slippers on his feet. He enters the kitchen.)

CHARLEY: Everything all right?
HAPPY: Yeah, Charley, everything’s…
WILLY: What’s the matter?
CHARLEY: I heard some noise. I thought something happened.

Can’t we do something about the walls? You sneeze in here,
and in my house hats blow off.

HAPPY: Let’s go to bed, Dad. Come on. (Charley signals to Happy
to go.)

WILLY: You go ahead, I’m not tired at the moment.
HAPPY (to Willy): Take it easy, huh? (He exits.)
WILLY: What’re you doin’ up?
CHARLEY (sitting down at the kitchen table opposite Willy):

Couldn’t sleep good. I had a heartburn.
WILLY: Well, you don’t know how to eat.
CHARLEY: I eat with my mouth.
WILLY: No, you’re ignorant. You gotta know about vitamins and

things like that.
CHARLEY: Come on, let’s shoot. Tire you out a little.
WILLY (hesitantly): All right. You got cards?
CHARLEY (taking a deck from his pocket): Yeah, I got them.

Someplace. What is it with those vitamins?

WILLY (dealing): They build up your bones. Chemistry.
CHARLEY: Yeah, but there’s no bones in a heartburn.
WILLY: What are you talkin’ about? Do you know the first thing

about it?
CHARLEY: Don’t get insulted.
WILLY: Don’t talk about something you don’t know anything

about.

(They are playing. Pause.)

CHARLEY: What’re you doin’ home?
WILLY: A little trouble with the car.
CHARLEY: Oh. (Pause.) I’d like to take a trip to California.
WILLY: Don’t say.
CHARLEY: You want a job?
WILLY: I got a job, I told you that. (After a slight pause.) What

the hell are you offering me a job for?
CHARLEY: Don’t get insulted.
WILLY: Don’t insult me.
CHARLEY: I don’t see no sense in it. You don’t have to go on this

way.
WILLY: I got a good job. (Slight pause.) What do you keep comin’

in here for?
CHARLEY: You want me to go?
WILLY (after a pause, withering): I can’t understand it. He’s go-

ing back to Texas again. What the hell is that?
CHARLEY: Let him go.
WILLY: I got nothin’ to give him, Charley, I’m clean, I’m clean.
CHARLEY: He won’t starve. None a them starve. Forget about

him.
WILLY: Then what have I got to remember?
CHARLEY: You take it too hard. To hell with it. When a deposit

bottle is broken you don’t get your nickel back.
WILLY: That’s easy enough for you to say.
CHARLEY: That ain’t easy for me to say.
WILLY: Did you see the ceiling I put up in the living room?

CHARLEY: Yeah, that’s a piece of work. To put up a ceiling is a
mystery to me. How do you do it?

WILLY: What’s the difference?
CHARLEY: Well, talk about it.
WILLY: You gonna put up a ceiling?
CHARLEY: How could I put up a ceiling?
WILLY: Then what the hell are you bothering me for?
CHARLEY: You’re insulted again.
WILLY: A man who can’t handle tools is not a man. You’re

disgusting.
CHARLEY: Don’t call me disgusting, Willy.

(Uncle Ben, carrying a valise and an umbrella, enters the fore-
stage from around the right corner of the house. He is a stolid man,
in his sixties, with a mustache and an authoritative air. He is ut-
terly certain of his destiny, and there is an aura of far places about
him. He enters exactly as Willy speaks.)

WILLY: I’m getting awfully tired, Ben.

(Ben’s music is heard. Ben looks around at everything.)

CHARLEY: Good, keep playing; you’ll sleep better. Did you call
me Ben?

(Ben looks at his watch.)

WILLY: That’s funny. For a second there you reminded me of my
brother Ben.

BEN: I only have a few minutes. (He strolls, inspecting the place.
Willy and Charley continue playing.)

CHARLEY: You never heard from him again, heh? Since that
time?

WILLY: Didn’t Linda tell you? Couple of weeks ago we got a letter
from his wife in Africa. He died.

CHARLEY: That so.
BEN (chuckling): So this is Brooklyn, eh?
CHARLEY: Maybe you’re in for some of his money.
WILLY: Naa, he had seven sons. There’s just one opportunity I

had with that man…

BEN: I must make a tram, William. There are several properties
I’m looking at in Alaska.

WILLY: Sure, sure! If I’d gone with him to Alaska that time, eve-
rything would’ve been totally different.

CHARLEY: Go on, you’d froze to death up there.
WILLY: What’re you talking about?
BEN: Opportunity is tremendous in Alaska, William. Surprised

you’re not up there.
WILLY: Sure, tremendous.
CHARLEY: Heh?
WILLY: There was the only man I ever met who knew the an-

swers.
CHARLEY: Who?
BEN: How are you all?
WILLY (taking a pot, smiling): Fine, fine.
CHARLEY: Pretty sharp tonight.
BEN: Is Mother living with you?
WILLY: No, she died a long time ago.
CHARLEY: Who?
BEN: That’s too bad. Fine specimen of a lady, Mother.
WILLY (to Charley): Heh?
BEN: I’d hoped to see the old girl.
CHARLEY: Who died?
BEN: Heard anything from Father, have you?
WILLY (unnerved): What do you mean, who died?
CHARLEY (taking a pot): What’re you talkin’ about?
BEN (looking at his watch): William, it’s half past eight!
WILLY (as though to dispel his confusion he angrily stops Char-

ley’s hand). That’s my build!
CHARLEY: I put the ace…
WILLY: If you don’t know how to play the game I’m not gonna

throw my money away on you!
CHARLEY (rising): It was my ace, for God’s sake!
WILLY: I’m through, I’m through!

BEN: When did Mother die?
WILLY: Long ago. Since the beginning you never knew how to

play cards.
CHARLEY (picks up the cards and goes to the door): All right!

Next time I’ll bring a deck with five aces.
WILLY: I don’t play that kind of game!
CHARLEY (turning to him): You ought to be ashamed of yourself!
WILLY: Yeah?
CHARLEY: Yeah! (he goes out.)
WILLY (slamming the door after him): Ignoramus!
BEN (as Willy comes toward him through the wall-line of the

kitchen): So you’re William.
WILLY (shaking Ben’s hand): Ben! I’ve been waiting for you so

long! What’s the answer? How did you do it?
BEN: Oh, there’s a story in that.

(Linda enters the forestage, as of old, carrying the wash basket.)

LINDA: Is this Ben?
BEN (gallantly): How do you do, my dear.
LINDA: Where’ve you been all these years? Willy’s always won-

dered why you…
WILLY (pulling Ben away from her impatiently): Where is Dad?

Didn’t you follow him? How did you get started?
BEN: Well, I don’t know how much you remember.
WILLY: Well, I was just a baby, of course, only three or four years

old…
BEN: Three years and eleven months.
WILLY: What a memory, Ben!
BEN: I have many enterprises, William, and I have never kept

books.
WILLY: I remember I was sitting under the wagon in — was it

Nebraska?
BEN: It was South Dakota, and I gave you a bunch of wild flow-

ers.
WILLY: I remember you walking away down some open road.

BEN (laughing): I was going to find Father in Alaska.
WILLY: Where is he?
BEN: At that age I had a very faulty view of geography, William. I

discovered after a few days that I was heading due south, so in-
stead of Alaska, I ended up in Africa.

LINDA: Africa!
WILLY: The Gold Coast!
BEN: Principally diamond mines.
LINDA: Diamond mines!
BEN: Yes, my dear. But I’ve only a few minutes…
WILLY: No! Boys! Boys! (Young Biff and Happy appear.) Listen to

this. This is your Uncle Ben, a great man! Tell my boys, Ben!
BEN: Why, boys, when I was seventeen I walked into the jungle,

and when I was twenty-one I walked out. (He laughs.) And by
God I was rich.

WILLY (to the boys): You see what I been talking about? The
greatest things can happen!

BEN (glancing at his watch): I have an appointment in Ketchikan
Tuesday week.

WILLY: No, Ben! Please tell about Dad. I want my boys to hear. I
want them to know the kind of stock they spring from. All I
remember is a man with a big beard, and I was in Mamma’s
lap, sitting around a fire, and some kind of high music.

BEN: His flute. He played the flute.
WILLY: Sure, the flute, that’s right!

(New music is heard, a high, rollicking tune.)

BEN: Father was a very great and a very wild-hearted man. We
would start in Boston, and he’d toss the whole family into the
wagon, and then he’d drive the team right across the country;
through Ohio, and Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, and all the
Western states. And we’d stop in the towns and sell the flutes
that he’d made on the way. Great inventor, Father. With one
gadget he made more in a week than a man like you could
make in a lifetime.

WILLY: That’s just the way I’m bringing them up, Ben — rugged,
well liked, all-around.

BEN: Yeah? (To Biff.) Hit that, boy — hard as you can. (He
pounds his stomach.)

BIFF: Oh, no, sir!
BEN (taking boxing stance): Come on, get to me! (He laughs)
WILLY: Go to it, Biff! Go ahead, show him!
BIFF: Okay! (He cocks his fists and starts in.)
LINDA (to Willy): Why must he fight, dear?
BEN (sparring with Biff): Good boy! Good boy!
WILLY: How’s that, Ben, heh?
HAPPY: Give him the left, Biff!
LINDA: Why are you fighting?
BEN: Good boy! (Suddenly comes in, trips Biff, and stands over

him, the point of his umbrella poised over Biffs eye.)
LINDA: Look out, Biff!
BIFF: Gee!
BEN (Patting Biffs knee): Never fight fair with a stranger, boy.

You’ll never get out of the jungle that way. (Taking Linda’s
hand and bowing.) It was an honor and a pleasure to meet you,
Linda.

LINDA (withdrawing her hand coldly, frightened): Have a nice
trip.

BEN (to Willy): And good luck with your — what do you do?
WILLY: Selling.
BEN: Yes. Well… (He raises his hand in farewell to all.)
WILLY: No, Ben, I don’t want you to think… (He takes Ben’s arm

to show him) It’s Brooklyn, I know, but we hunt too.
BEN: Really, now.
WILLY: Oh, sure, there’s snakes and rabbits and — that’s why I

moved out here. Why Biff can fell any one of these trees in no
time! Boys! Go right over to where they’re building the apart-
ment house and get some sand. We’re gonna rebuild the entire
front stoop right now! Watch this, Ben!

BIFF: Yes, sir! On the double, Hap!
HAPPY (as he and Biff run off): I lost weight, Pop, you notice?

(Charley enters in knickers, even before the boys are gone.)

CHARLEY: Listen, if they steal any more from that building the
watchman’ll put the cops on them!

LINDA (to Willy): Don’t let Biff…

(Ben laughs lustily.)

WILLY: You shoulda seen the lumber they brought home last
week. At least a dozen six-by-tens worth all kinds a money.

CHARLEY: Listen, if that watchman…
WILLY: I gave them hell, understand. But I got a couple of fear-

less characters there.
CHARLEY: Willy, the jails are full of fearless characters.
BEN (clapping Willy on the back, with a laugh at Charley): And

the stock exchange, friend!
WILLY (joining in Ben’s laughter): Where are the rest of your

pants?
CHARLEY: My wife bought them.
WILLY: Now all you need is a golf club and you can go upstairs

and go to sleep. (To Ben.) Great athlete! Between him and his
son Bernard they can’t hammer a nail!

BERNARD (rushing in): The watchman’s chasing Biff!
WILLY (angrily): Shut up! He’s not stealing anything!
LINDA (alarmed, hurrying off left): Where is he? Biff, dear! (She

exits.)
WILLY (moving toward the left, away from Ben): There’s nothing

wrong. What’s the matter with you?
BEN: Nervy boy. Good!
WILLY (laughing): Oh, nerves of iron, that Biff!
CHARLEY: Don’t know what it is. My New England man comes

back and he’s bleeding, they murdered him up there.
WILLY: It’s contacts, Charley, I got important contacts!
CHARLEY (sarcastically): Glad to hear it, Willy. Come in later,

we’ll shoot a little casino. I’ll take some of your Portland
money. (He laughs at Willy and exits.)

WILLY (turning to Ben): Business is bad, it’s murderous. But not
for me, of course.

BEN: I’ll stop by on my way back to Africa.

WILLY (longingly): Can’t you stay a few days? You’re just what I
need, Ben, because I — I have a fine position here, but I —
well, Dad left when I was such a baby and I never had a chance
to talk to him and I still feel — kind of temporary about myself.

BEN: I’ll be late for my train.
(They are at opposite ends of the stage.)

WILLY: Ben, my boys — can’t we talk? They’d go into the jaws of
hell for me see, but I…

BEN: William, you’re being first-rate with your boys. Out-
standing, manly chaps!

WILLY (hanging on to his words): Oh, Ben, that’s good to hear!
Because sometimes I’m afraid that I’m not teaching them the
right kind of — Ben, how should I teach them?

BEN (giving great weight to each word, and with a certain vicious
audacity): William, when I walked into the jungle, I was seven-
teen. When I walked out I was twenty-one. And, by God, I was
rich! (He goes off into darkness around the right corner of the
house.)

WILLY: …was rich! That’s just the spirit I want to imbue them
with! To walk into a jungle! I was right! I was right! I was
right!

(Ben is gone, but Willy is still speaking to him as Linda, in
nightgown and robe, enters the kitchen, glances around for Willy,
then goes to the door of the house, looks out and sees him. Comes
down to his left. He looks at her.)

LINDA: Willy, dear? Willy?
WILLY: I was right!
LINDA: Did you have some cheese? (He can’t answer.) It’s very

late, darling. Come to bed, heh?
WILLY (looking straight up): Gotta break your neck to see a star

in this yard.
LINDA: You coming in?
WILLY: Whatever happened to that diamond watch fob? Remem-

ber? When Ben came from Africa that time? Didn’t he give me
a watch fob with a diamond in it?

LINDA: You pawned it, dear. Twelve, thirteen years ago. For Biffs

radio correspondence course.
WILLY: Gee, that was a beautiful thing. I’ll take a walk.
LINDA: But you’re in your slippers.
WILLY (starting to go around the house at the left): I was right! I

was! (Half to Linda, as he goes, shaking his head.) What a man!
There was a man worth talking to. I was right!

LINDA (calling after Willy): But in your slippers, Willy!

(Willy is almost gone when Biff, in his pajamas, comes down
the stairs and enters the kitchen.)

BIFF: What is he doing out there?
LINDA: Sh!
BIFF: God Almighty. Mom, how long has he been doing this?
LINDA: Don’t, he’ll hear you.
BIFF: What the hell is the matter with him?
LINDA: It’ll pass by morning.
BIFF: Shouldn’t we do anything?
LINDA: Oh, my dear, you should do a lot of things, but there’s

nothing to do, so go to sleep.

(Happy comes down the stair and sits on the steps.)

HAPPY: I never heard him so loud, Mom.
LINDA: Well, come around more often; you’ll hear him. (She sits

down at the table and mends the lining of Willy’s jacket.)
BIFF: Why didn’t you ever write me about this, Mom?
LINDA: How would I write to you? For over three months you

had no address.
BIFF: I was on the move. But you know I thought of you all the

time. You know that, don’t you, pal?
LINDA: I know, dear, I know. But he likes to have a letter. Just to

know that there’s still a possibility for better things.
BIFF: He’s not like this all the time, is he?
LINDA: It’s when you come home he’s always the worst.
BIFF: When I come home?
LINDA: When you write you’re coming, he’s all smiles, and talks

about the future, and — he’s just wonderful. And then the

closer you seem to come, the more shaky he gets, and then, by
the time you get here, he’s arguing, and he seems angry at you.
I think it’s just that maybe he can’t bring himself to — to open
up to you. Why are you so hateful to each other? Why is that?

BIFF (evasively): I’m not hateful, Mom.
LINDA: But you no sooner come in the door than you’re fighting!
BIFF: I don’t know why. I mean to change. I’m tryin’, Mom, you

understand?
LINDA: Are you home to stay now?
BIFF: I don’t know. I want to look around, see what’s doin’.
LINDA: Biff, you can’t look around all your life, can you?
BIFF: I just can’t take hold, Mom. I can’t take hold of some kind

of a life.
LINDA: Biff, a man is not a bird, to come and go with the spring-

time.
BIFF: Your hair… (He touches her hair.) Your hair got so gray.
LINDA: Oh, it’s been gray since you were in high school. I just

stopped dyeing it, that’s all.
BIFF: Dye it again, will ya? I don’t want my pal looking old. (He

smiles.)
LINDA: You’re such a boy! You think you can go away for a year

and… You’ve got to get it into your head now that one day
you’ll knock on this door and there’ll be strange people here…

BIFF: What are you talking about? You’re not even sixty, Mom.
LINDA: But what about your father?
BIFF (lamely): Well, I meant him too.
HAPPY: He admires Pop.
LINDA: Biff, dear, if you don’t have any feeling for him, then you

can’t have any feeling for me.
BIFF: Sure I can, Mom.
LINDA: No. You can’t just come to see me, because I love him.

(With a threat, but only a threat, of tears.) He’s the dearest man
in the world to me, and I won’t have anyone making him feel
unwanted and low and blue. You’ve got to make up your mind
now, darling, there’s no leeway any more. Either he’s your fa-
ther and you pay him that respect, or else you’re not to come

here. I know he’s not easy to get along with — nobody knows
that better than me — but…

WILLY (from the left, with a laugh): Hey, hey, Biffo!
BIFF (starting to go out after Willy): What the hell is the matter

with him? (Happy stops him.)
LINDA: Don’t — don’t go near him!
BIFF: Stop making excuses for him! He always, always wiped the

floor with you. Never had an ounce of respect for you.
HAPPY: He’s always had respect for…
BIFF: What the hell do you know about it?
HAPPY (surlily): Just don’t call him crazy!
BIFF: He’s got no character — Charley wouldn’t do this. Not in

his own house — spewing out that vomit from his mind.
HAPPY: Charley never had to cope with what he’s got to.
BIFF: People are worse off than Willy Loman. Believe me, I’ve

seen them!
LINDA: Then make Charley your father, Biff. You can’t do that,

can you? I don’t say he’s a great man. Willy Loman never made
a lot of money. His name was never in the paper. He’s not the
finest character that ever lived. But he’s a human being, and a
terrible thing is happening to him. So attention must be paid.
He’s not to be allowed to fall into his grave like an old dog. At-
tention, attention must be finally paid to such a person. You
called him crazy…

BIFF: I didn’t mean…
LINDA: No, a lot of people think he’s lost his — balance. But you

don’t have to be very smart to know what his trouble is. The
man is exhausted.

HAPPY: Sure!
LINDA: A small man can be just as exhausted as a great man. He

works for a company thirty-six years this March, opens up un-
heard-of territories to their trademark, and now in his old age
they take his salary away.

HAPPY (indignantly): I didn’t know that, Mom.
LINDA: You never asked, my dear! Now that you get your spend-

ing money someplace else you don’t trouble your mind with
him.

HAPPY: But I gave you money last…
LINDA: Christmas time, fifty dollars! To fix the hot water it cost

ninety-seven fifty! For five weeks he’s been on straight com-
mission, like a beginner, an unknown!

BIFF: Those ungrateful bastards!
LINDA: Are they any worse than his sons? When he brought them

business, when he was young, they were glad to see him. But
now his old friends, the old buyers that loved him so and al-
ways found some order to hand him in a pinch — they’re all
dead, retired. He used to be able to make six, seven calls a day
in Boston. Now he takes his valises out of the car and puts
them back and takes them out again and he’s exhausted. In-
stead of walking he talks now. He drives seven hundred miles,
and when he gets there no one knows him any more, no one
welcomes him. And what goes through a man’s mind, driving
seven hundred miles home without having earned a cent? Why
shouldn’t he talk to himself? Why? When he has to go to Char-
ley and borrow fifty dollars a week and pretend to me that it’s
his pay? How long can that go on? How long? You see what I’m
sitting here and waiting for? And you tell me he has no charac-
ter? The man who never worked a day but for your benefit?
When does he get the medal for that? Is this his reward — to
turn around at the age of sixty-three and find his sons, who he
loved better than his life, one a philandering bum…

HAPPY: Mom!
LINDA: That’s all you are, my baby! (To Biff.) And you! What

happened to the love you had for him? You were such pals!
How you used to talk to him on the phone every night! How
lonely he was till he could come home to you!

BIFF: All right, Mom. I’ll live here in my room, and I’ll get a job.
I’ll keep away from him, that’s all.

LINDA: No, Biff. You can’t stay here and fight all the time.
BIFF: He threw me out of this house, remember that.
LINDA: Why did he do that? I never knew why.
BIFF: Because I know he’s a fake and he doesn’t like anybody

around who knows!
LINDA: Why a fake? In what way? What do you mean?
BIFF: Just don’t lay it all at my feet. It’s between me and him —

that’s all I have to say. I’ll chip in from now on. He’ll settle for
half my pay check. He’ll be all right. I’m going to bed. (He
starts for the stairs.)

LINDA: He won’t be all right.
BIFF (turning on the stairs, furiously): I hate this city and I’ll stay

here. Now what do you want?
LINDA: He’s dying, Biff.

(Happy turns quickly to her, shocked.)

BIFF (after a pause): Why is he dying?
LINDA: He’s been trying to kill himself.
BIFF (with great horror): How?
LINDA: I live from day to day.
BIFF: What’re you talking about?
LINDA: Remember I wrote you that he smashed up the car again?

In February?
BIFF: Well?
LINDA: The insurance inspector came. He said that they have

evidence. That all these accidents in the last year — weren’t —
weren’t — accidents.

HAPPY: How can they tell that? That’s a lie.
LINDA: It seems there’s a woman… (She takes a breath as:)
BIFF (sharply but contained): What woman?
LINDA (simultaneously):… and this woman…
LINDA: What?
BIFF: Nothing. Go ahead.
LINDA: What did you say?
BIFF: Nothing, I just said what woman?
HAPPY: What about her?
LINDA: Well, it seems she was walking down the road and saw his

car. She says that he wasn’t driving fast at all, and that he
didn’t skid. She says he came to that little bridge, and then de-
liberately smashed into the railing, and it was only the shal-
lowness of the water that saved him.

BIFF: Oh, no, he probably just fell asleep again.
LINDA: I don’t think he fell asleep.

BIFF: Why not?
LINDA: Last month… (With great difficulty.) Oh, boys, it’s so hard

to say a thing like this! He’s just a big stupid man to you, but I
tell you there’s more good in him than in many other people.
(She chokes, wipes her eyes.) I was looking for a fuse. The lights
blew out, and I went down the cellar. And behind the fuse box
— it happened to fall out — was a length of rubber pipe — just
short.

HAPPY: No kidding!
LINDA: There’s a little attachment on the end of it. I knew right

away. And sure enough, on the bottom of the water heater
there’s a new little nipple on the gas pipe.

HAPPY (angrily): That — jerk.
BIFF: Did you have it taken off?
LINDA: I’m — I’m ashamed to. How can I mention it to him?

Every day I go down and take away that little rubber pipe. But,
when he comes home, I put it back where it was. How can I in-
sult him that way? I don’t know what to do. I live from day to
day, boys. I tell you, I know every thought in his mind. It
sounds so old-fashioned and silly, but I tell you he put his
whole life into you and you’ve turned your backs on him. (She
is bent over in the chair, weeping, her face in her hands.) Biff, I
swear to God! Biff, his life is in your hands!

HAPPY (to Biff): How do you like that damned fool!
BIFF (kissing her): All right, pal, all right. It’s all settled now. I’ve

been remiss. I know that, Mom. But now I’ll stay, and I swear
to you, I’ll apply myself. (Kneeling in front of her, in a fever of
self-reproach.) It’s just — you see, Mom, I don’t fit in business.
Not that I won’t try. I’ll try, and I’ll make good.

HAPPY: Sure you will. The trouble with you in business was you
never tried to please people.

BIFF: I know, I…
HAPPY: Like when you worked for Harrison’s. Bob Harrison said

you were tops, and then you go and do some damn fool thing
like whistling whole songs in the elevator like a comedian.

BIFF (against Happy): So what? I like to whistle sometimes.
HAPPY: You don’t raise a guy to a responsible job who whistles in

the elevator!
LINDA: Well, don’t argue about it now.
HAPPY: Like when you’d go off and swim in the middle of the day

instead of taking the line around.
BIFF (his resentment rising): Well, don’t you run off? You take off

sometimes, don’t you? On a nice summer day?
HAPPY: Yeah, but I cover myself!
LINDA: Boys!
HAPPY: If I’m going to take a fade the boss can call any number

where I’m supposed to be and they’ll swear to him that I just
left. I’ll tell you something that I hate so say, Biff, but in the
business world some of them think you’re crazy.

BIFF (angered): Screw the business world!
HAPPY: All right, screw it! Great, but cover yourself!
LINDA: Hap, Hap.
BIFF: I don’t care what they think! They’ve laughed at Dad for

years, and you know why? Because we don’t belong in this
nuthouse of a city! We should be mixing cement on some open
plain or — or carpenters. A carpenter is allowed to whistle!
(Willy walks in from the entrance of the house, at left.)

WILLY: Even your grandfather was better than a carpenter.
(Pause. They watch him.) You never grew up. Bernard does not
whistle in the elevator, I assure you.

BIFF (as though to laugh Willy out of it): Yeah, but you do, Pop.
WILLY: I never in my life whistled in an elevator! And who in the

business world thinks I’m crazy?
BIFF: I didn’t mean it like that, Pop. Now don’t make a whole

thing out of it, will ya?
WILLY: Go back to the West! Be a carpenter, a cowboy, enjoy

yourself!
LINDA: Willy, he was just saying…
WILLY: I heard what he said!
HAPPY (trying to quiet Willy): Hey, Pop, come on now…
WILLY (continuing over Happy’s line): They laugh at me, heh? Go

to Filene’s, go to the Hub, go to Slattery’s, Boston. Call out the
name Willy Loman and see what happens! Big shot!

BIFF: All right, Pop.
WILLY: Big!
BIFF: All right!
WILLY: Why do you always insult me?
BIFF: I didn’t say a word. (To Linda.) Did I say a word?
LINDA: He didn’t say anything, Willy.
WILLY (going to the doorway of the living room): All right, good

night, good night.
LINDA: Willy, dear, he just decided…
WILLY (to Biff): If you get tired hanging around tomorrow, paint

the ceiling I put up in the living room.
BIFF: I’m leaving early tomorrow.
HAPPY: He’s going to see Bill Oliver, Pop.
WILLY (interestedly): Oliver? For what?
BIFF (with reserve, but trying, trying): He always said he’d stake

me. I’d like to go into business, so maybe I can take him up on
it.

LINDA: Isn’t that wonderful?
WILLY: Don’t interrupt. What’s wonderful about it? There’s fifty

men in the City of New York who’d stake him. (To Biff.) Sport-
ing goods?

BIFF: I guess so. I know something about it and…
WILLY: He knows something about it! You know sporting goods

better than Spalding, for God’s sake! How much is he giving
you?

BIFF: I don’t know, I didn’t even see him yet, but…
WILLY: Then what’re you talkin’ about?
BIFF (getting angry): Well, all I said was I’m gonna see him, that’s

all!
WILLY (turning away): Ah, you’re counting your chickens again.
BIFF (starting left for the stairs.): Oh, Jesus, I’m going to sleep!
WILLY (calling after him): Don’t curse in this house!
BIFF (turning): Since when did you get so clean?
HAPPY (trying to stop them): Wait a…
WILLY: Don’t use that language to me! I won’t have it!

HAPPY (grabbing Biff, shouts): Wait a minute! I got an idea. I got
a feasible idea. Come here, Biff, let’s talk this over now, let’s
talk some sense here. When I was down in Florida last time, I
thought of a great idea to sell sporting goods. It just came back
to me. You and I, Biff — we have a line, the Loman Line. We
train a couple of weeks, and put on a couple of exhibitions, see?

WILLY: That’s an idea!
HAPPY: Wait! We form two basketball teams, see? Two water-

polo teams. We play each other. It’s a million dollars’ worth of
publicity. Two brothers, see? The Loman Brothers. Displays in
the Royal Palms — all the hotels. And banners over the ring
and the basketball court: »Loman Brothers«. Baby, we could
sell sporting goods!

WILLY: That is a one-million-dollar idea!
LINDA: Marvelous!
BIFF: I’m in great shape as far as that’s concerned.
HAPPY: And the beauty of it is, Biff, it wouldn’t be like a busi-

ness. We’d be out playin’ ball again…
BIFF (enthused): Yeah, that’s…
WILLY: Million-dollar…
HAPPY: And you wouldn’t get fed up with it, Biff. It’d be the fam-

ily again. There’d be the old honor, and comradeship, and if
you wanted to go off for a swim or somethin’ — well, you’d do
it! Without some smart cooky gettin’ up ahead of you!

WILLY: Lick the world! You guys together could absolutely lick
the civilized world.

BIFF: I’ll see Oliver tomorrow. Hap, if we could work that out…
LINDA: Maybe things are beginning to…
WILLY (wildly enthused, to Linda): Stop interrupting! (To Biff.)

But don’t wear sport jacket and slacks when you see Oliver.
BIFF: No, I’ll…
WILLY: A business suit, and talk as little as possible, and don’t

crack any jokes.
BIFF: He did like me. Always liked me.
LINDA: He loved you!
WILLY (to Linda): Will you stop! (To Biff.) Walk in very serious.

You are not applying for a boy’s job. Money is to pass. Be quiet,
fine, and serious. Everybody likes a kidder, but nobody lends
him money.

HAPPY: I’ll try to get some myself, Biff. I’m sure I can.
WILLY: I see great things for you kids, I think your troubles are

over. But remember, start big and you’ll end big. Ask for fif-
teen. How much you gonna ask for?

BIFF: Gee, I don’t know…
WILLY: And don’t say »Gee«. »Gee« is a boy’s word. A man walk-

ing in for fifteen thousand dollars does not say »Gee!«
BIFF: Ten, I think, would be top though.
WILLY: Don’t be so modest. You always started too low. Walk in

with a big laugh. Don’t look worried. Start off with a couple of
your good stones to lighten things up. It’s not what you say,
it’s how you say it — because personality always wins the day.

LINDA: Oliver always thought the highest of him…
WILLY: Will you let me talk?
BIFF: Don’t yell at her, Pop, will ya?
WILLY (angrily): I was talking, wasn’t I?
BIFF: I don’t like you yelling at her all the time, and I’m tellin’

you, that’s all.
WILLY: What’re you, takin’ over this house?
LINDA: Willy…
WILLY (turning to her): Don’t take his side all the time, goddam-

mit!
BIFF (furiously): Stop yelling at her!
WILLY (suddenly pulling on his cheek, beaten down, guilt ridden):

Give my best to Bill Oliver — he may remember me. (He exits
through the living room doorway.)

LINDA (her voice subdued): What’d you have to start that for?
(Biff turns away.) You see how sweet he was as soon as you
talked hopefully? (She goes over to Biff.) Come up and say good
night to him. Don’t let him go to bed that way.

HAPPY: Come on, Biff, let’s buck him up.
LINDA: Please, dear. Just say good night. It takes so little to

make him happy. Come. (She goes through the living room

doorway, calling upstairs from within the living room.) Your
pajamas are hanging in the bathroom, Willy!

HAPPY (looking toward where Linda went out): What a woman!
They broke the mold when they made her. You know that,
Biff?

BIFF: He’s off salary. My God, working on commission!
HAPPY: Well, let’s face it: he’s no hot-shot selling man. Except

that sometimes, you have to admit, he’s a sweet personality.
BIFF (deciding): Lend me ten bucks, will ya? I want to buy some

new ties.
HAPPY: I’ll take you to a place I know. Beautiful stuff. Wear one

of my striped shirts tomorrow.
BIFF: She got gray. Mom got awful old. Gee, I’m gonna go in to

Oliver tomorrow and knock him for a…
HAPPY: Come on up. Tell that to Dad. Let’s give him a whirl.

Come on.
BIFF (steamed up): You know, with ten thousand bucks, boy!
HAPPY (as they go into the living room): That’s the talk, Biff,

that’s the first time I’ve heard the old confidence out of you!
(From within the living room, fading off.) You’re gonna live
with me, kid, and any babe you want just say the word… (The
last lines are hardly heard. They are mounting the stairs to
their parents’ bedroom.)

LINDA (entering her bedroom and addressing Willy, who is in the
bathroom. She is straightening the bed for him): Can you do
anything about the shower? It drips.

WILLY (from the bathroom): All of a sudden everything falls to
pieces. Goddam plumbing, oughta be sued, those people. I
hardly finished putting it in and the thing… (His words rumble
off.)

LINDA: I’m just wondering if Oliver will remember him. You
think he might?

WILLY (coming out of the bathroom in his pajamas): Remember
him? What’s the matter with you, you crazy? If he’d’ve stayed
with Oliver he’d be on top by now! Wait’ll Oliver gets a look at
him. You don’t know the average caliber any more. The aver-
age young man today — (he is getting into bed) — is got a cali-
ber of zero. Greatest thing in the world for him was to bum

around.

(Biff and Happy enter the bedroom. Slight pause.)

WILLY (stops short, looking at Biff): Glad to hear it, boy.
HAPPY: He wanted to say good night to you, sport.
WILLY (to Biff): Yeah. Knock him dead, boy. What’d you want to

tell me?
BIFF: Just take it easy, Pop. Good night. (He turns to go.)
WILLY (unable to resist): And if anything falls off the desk while

you’re talking to him — like a package or something — don’t
you pick it up. They have office boys for that.

LINDA: I’ll make a big breakfast…
WILLY: Will you let me finish? (To Biff.) Tell him you were in the

business in the West. Not farm work.
BIFF: All right, Dad.
LINDA: I think everything…
WILLY (going right through her speech): And don’t undersell

yourself. No less than fifteen thousand dollars.
BIFF (unable to bear him): Okay. Good night, Mom. (He starts

moving.)
WILLY: Because you got a greatness in you, Biff, remember that.

You got all kinds a greatness… (He lies back, exhausted. Biff
walks out.)

LINDA (calling after Biff): Sleep well, darling!
HAPPY: I’m gonna get married, Mom. I wanted to tell you.
LINDA: Go to sleep, dear.
HAPPY (going): I just wanted to tell you.
WILLY: Keep up the good work. (Happy exits.) God… remember

that Ebbets Field game? The championship of the city?
LINDA: Just rest. Should I sing to you?
WILLY: Yeah. Sing to me. (Linda hums a soft lullaby.) When that

team came out — he was the tallest, remember?
LINDA: Oh, yes. And in gold.

(Biff enters the darkened kitchen, takes a cigarette, and leaves
the house. He comes downstage into a golden pool of light. He
smokes, staring at the night.)

WILLY: Like a young god. Hercules — something like that. And
the sun, the sun all around him. Remember how he waved to
me? Right up from the field, with the representatives of three
colleges standing by? And the buyers I brought, and the cheers
when he came out — Loman, Loman, Loman! God Almighty,
he’ll be great yet. A star like that, magnificent, can never really
fade away!

(The light on Willy is fading. The gas heater begins to glow
through the kitchen wall, near the stairs, a blue flame beneath red
coils.)

LINDA (timidly): Willy dear, what has he got against you?
WILLY: I’m so tired. Don’t talk any more.

(Biff slowly returns to the kitchen. He stops, stares toward the
heater.)

LINDA: Will you ask Howard to let you work in New York?
WILLY: First thing in the morning. Everything’ll be all right.

(Biff reaches behind the heater and draws out a length of rubber
tubing. He is horrified and turns his head toward Willy’s room,
still dimly lit, from which the strains of Linda’s desperate but mo-
notonous humming rise.)

WILLY (staring through the window into the moonlight): Gee,
look at the moon moving between the buildings!

(Biff wraps the tubing around his hand and quickly goes up the
stairs.)

ACT TWO

Music is heard, gay and bright. The curtain rises as the music
fades away. Willy, in shirt sleeves, is sitting at the kitchen table,
sipping coffee, his hat in his lap. Linda is filling his cup when she
can.

WILLY: Wonderful coffee. Meal in itself.
LINDA: Can I make you some eggs?
WILLY: No. Take a breath.
LINDA: You look so rested, dear.
WILLY: I slept like a dead one. First time in months. Imagine,

sleeping till ten on a Tuesday morning. Boys left nice and
early, heh?

LINDA: They were out of here by eight o’clock.
WILLY: Good work!
LINDA: It was so thrilling to see them leaving together. I can’t

get over the shaving lotion in this house!
WILLY (smiling): Mmm…
LINDA: Biff was very changed this morning. His whole attitude

seemed to be hopeful. He couldn’t wait to get downtown to see
Oliver.

WILLY: He’s heading for a change. There’s no question, there
simply are certain men that take longer to get — solidified.
How did he dress?

LINDA: His blue suit. He’s so handsome in that suit. He could be
a — anything in that suit!

(Willy gets up from the table. Linda holds his jacket for him.)

WILLY: There’s no question, no question at all. Gee, on the way
home tonight I’d like to buy some seeds.

LINDA (laughing): That’d be wonderful. But not enough sun gets
back there. Nothing’ll grow any more.

WILLY: You wait, kid, before it’s all over we’re gonna get a little
place out in the country, and I’ll raise some vegetables, a cou-
ple of chickens…

LINDA: You’ll do it yet, dear.

(Willy walks out of his jacket. Linda follows him.)
WILLY: And they’ll get married, and come for a weekend. I’d

build a little guest house. ‘Cause I got so many fine tools, all I’d
need would be a little lumber and some peace of mind.

LINDA (joyfully): I sewed the lining…
WILLY: I could build two guest houses, so they’d both come. Did

he decide how much he’s going to ask Oliver for?
LINDA (getting him into the jacket): He didn’t mention it, but I

imagine ten or fifteen thousand. You going to talk to Howard
today?

WILLY: Yeah. I’ll put it to him straight and simple. He’ll just
have to take me off the road.

LINDA: And Willy, don’t forget to ask for a little advance, because
we’ve got the insurance premium. It’s the grace period now.

WILLY: That’s a hundred… ?
LINDA: A hundred and eight, sixty-eight. Because we’re a little

short again.
WILLY: Why are we short?
LINDA: Well, you had the motor job on the car…
WILLY: That goddam Studebaker!
LINDA: And you got one more payment on the refrigerator…
WILLY: But it just broke again!
LINDA: Well, it’s old, dear.
WILLY: I told you we should’ve bought a well-advertised machine.

Charley bought a General Electric and it’s twenty years old
and it’s still good, that son-of-a-bitch.

LINDA: But, Willy…
WILLY: Whoever heard of a Hastings refrigerator? Once in my

life I would like to own something outright before it’s broken!
I’m always in a race with the junkyard! I just finished paying
for the car and it’s on its last legs. The refrigerator consumes
belts like a goddam maniac. They time those things. They time
them so when you finally paid for them, they’re used up.

LINDA (buttoning up his jacket as he unbuttons it): All told, about
two hundred dollars would carry us, dear. But that includes the
last payment on the mortgage. After this payment, Willy, the
house belongs to us.

WILLY: It’s twenty-five years!
LINDA: Biff was nine years old when we bought it.
WILLY: Well, that’s a great thing. To weather a twenty-five year

mortgage is…
LINDA: It’s an accomplishment.
WILLY: All the cement, the lumber, the reconstruction I put in

this house! There ain’t a crack to be found in it any more.
LINDA: Well, it served its purpose.
WILLY: What purpose? Some stranger’ll come along, move in, and

that’s that. If only Biff would take this house, and raise a fam-
ily… (He starts to go.) Good-by, I’m late.

LINDA (suddenly remembering): Oh, I forgot! You’re supposed to
meet them for dinner.

WILLY: Me?
LINDA: At Frank’s Chop House on Forty-eighth near Sixth Ave-

nue.
WILLY: Is that so! How about you?
LINDA: No, just the three of you. They’re gonna blow you to a big

meal!
WILLY: Don’t say! Who thought of that?
LINDA: Biff came to me this morning, Willy, and he said, »Tell

Dad, we want to blow him to a big meal.« Be there six o’clock.
You and your two boys are going to have dinner.

WILLY: Gee whiz! That’s really somethin’. I’m gonna knock
Howard for a loop, kid. I’ll get an advance, and I’ll come home
with a New York job. Goddammit, now I’m gonna do it!

LINDA: Oh, that’s the spirit, Willy!
WILLY: I will never get behind a wheel the rest of my life!
LINDA: It’s changing. Willy, I can feel it changing!
WILLY: Beyond a question. G’by, I’m late. (He starts to go again.)
LINDA (calling after him as she runs to the kitchen table for a

handkerchief): You got your glasses?
WILLY: (feels for them, then comes back in): Yeah, yeah, got my

glasses.
LINDA: (giving him the handkerchief): And a handkerchief.
WILLY: Yeah, handkerchief.

LINDA: And your saccharine?
WILLY: Yeah, my saccharine.
LINDA: Be careful on the subway stairs.
(She kisses him, and a silk stocking is seen hanging from her
hand. Willy notices it.)
WILLY: Will you stop mending stockings? At least while I’m in
the house. It gets me nervous. I can’t tell you. Please.

(Linda hides the stocking in her hand as she follows Willy
across the forestage in front of the house.)

LINDA: Remember, Frank’s Chop House.
WILLY (passing the apron): Maybe beets would grow out there.
LINDA (laughing): But you tried so many times.
WILLY: Yeah. Well, don’t work hard today. (He disappears

around the right corner of the house.)
LINDA: Be careful!

(As Willy vanishes, Linda waves to him. Suddenly the phone
rings. She runs across the stage and into the kitchen and lifts it.)

LINDA: Hello? Oh, Biff. I’m so glad you called, I just… Yes, sure, I
just told him. Yes, he’ll be there for dinner at six o’clock, I
didn’t forget. Listen, I was just dying to tell you. You know
that little rubber pipe I told you about? That he connected to
the gas heater? I finally decided to go down the cellar this
morning and take it away and destroy it. But it’s gone! Imag-
ine? He took it away himself, it isn’t there! (She listens.) When?
Oh, then you took it. Oh — nothing, it’s just that I’d hoped
he’d taken it away himself. Oh, I’m not worried, darling, be-
cause this morning he left in such high spirits, it was like the
old days! I’m not afraid any more. Did Mr. Oliver see you?…
Well, you wait there then. And make a nice impression on him,
darling. Just don’t perspire too much before you see him. And
have a nice time with Dad. He may have big news too!… That’s
right, a New York job. And be sweet to him tonight, dear. Be
loving to him. Because he’s only a little boat looking for a har-
bor. (She is trembling with sorrow and joy.) Oh, that’s wonder-
ful, Biff, you’ll save his life. Thanks, darling. Just put your arm
around him when he comes into the restaurant. Give him a

smile. That’s the boy… Good-by, dear. You got your comb?…
That’s fine. Good-by, Biff dear. (In the middle of her speech,
Howard Wagner, thirty-six, wheels on a small typewriter table
on which is a wire-recording machine and proceeds to plug it
in. This is on the left forestage. Light slowly fades on Linda as
it rises on Howard. Howard is intent on threading the machine
and only glances over his shoulder as Willy appears.)

WILLY: Pst! Pst!
HOWARD: Hello, Willy, come in.
WILLY: Like to have a little talk with you, Howard.
HOWARD: Sorry to keep you waiting. I’ll be with you in a minute.
WILLY: What’s that, Howard?
HOWARD: Didn’t you ever see one of these? Wire recorder.
WILLY: Oh. Can we talk a minute?
HOWARD: Records things. Just got delivery yesterday. Been driv-

ing me crazy, the most terrific machine I ever saw in my life. I
was up all night with it.

WILLY: What do you do with it?
HOWARD: I bought it for dictation, but you can do anything with

it. Listen to this. I had it home last night. Listen to what I
picked up. The first one is my daughter. Get this. (He flicks the
switch and »Roll out the Barrel« is heard being whistled.) Lis-
ten to that kid whistle.

WILLY: That is lifelike, isn’t it?
HOWARD: Seven years old. Get that tone.
WILLY: Ts, ts. Like to ask a little favor if you…

(The whistling breaks off, and the voice of Howard’s daughter
is heard.)

HIS DAUGHTER: »Now you, Daddy. »
HOWARD: She’s crazy for me! (Again the same song is whistled.)

That’s me! Ha! (He winks).
WILLY: You’re very good!

(The whistling breaks off again. The machine runs silent for a
moment.)

HOWARD: Sh! Get this now, this is my son.

HIS SON: »The capital of Alabama is Montgomery; the capital of
Arizona is Phoenix; the capital of Arkansas is Little Rock; the
capital of California is Sacramento…« and on, and on.)

HOWARD (holding up five fingers): Five years old. Willy!
WILLY: He’ll make an announcer some day!
HIS SON (continuing): »The capital…«
HOWARD: Get that — alphabetical order! (The machine breaks

off suddenly.) Wait a minute. The maid kicked the plug out.
WILLY: It certainly is a…
HOWARD: Sh, for God’s sake!
HIS SON: »It’s nine o’clock, Bulova watch time. So I have to go to

sleep.«
WILLY: That really is…
HOWARD: Wait a minute! The next is my wife. (They wait).
HOWARD’S VOICE: »Go on, say something.« (Pause.) »Well, you

gonna talk?«
HIS WIFE: »I can’t think of anything.«
HOWARD’S VOICE: »Well, talk — it’s turning.«
HIS WIFE (shyly, beaten): »Hello.« (Silence.) »Oh, Howard, I can’t

talk into this…«
HOWARD (snapping the machine off): That was my wife.
WILLY: That is a wonderful machine. Can we…
HOWARD: I tell you, Willy, I’m gonna take my camera, and my

bandsaw, and all my hobbies, and out they go. This is the most
fascinating relaxation I ever found.

WILLY: I think I’ll get one myself.
HOWARD: Sure, they’re only a hundred and a half. You can’t do

without it. Supposing you wanna hear Jack Benny, see? But
you can’t be at home at that hour. So you tell the maid to turn
the radio on when Jack Benny comes on, and this automati-
cally goes on with the radio…

WILLY: And when you come home you…
HOWARD: You can come home twelve o’clock, one o’clock, any

time you like, and you get yourself a Coke and sit yourself
down, throw the switch, and there’s Jack Benny’s program in
the middle of the night!

WILLY: I’m definitely going to get one. Because lots of times I’m
on the road, and I think to myself, what I must be missing on
the radio!

HOWARD: Don’t you have a radio in the car?
WILLY: Well, yeah, but who ever thinks of turning it on?
HOWARD: Say, aren’t you supposed to be in Boston?
WILLY: That’s what I want to talk to you about, Howard. You got

a minute? (He draws a chair in from the wing).
HOWARD: What happened? What’re you doing here?
WILLY: Well…
HOWARD: You didn’t crack up again, did you?
WILLY: Oh, no. No…
HOWARD: Geez, you had me worried there for a minute. What’s

the trouble?
WILLY: Well, tell you the truth, Howard. I’ve come to the deci-

sion that I’d rather not travel any more.
HOWARD: Not travel! Well, what’ll you do?
WILLY: Remember, Christmas time, when you had the party

here? You said you’d try to think of some spot for me here in
town.

HOWARD: With us?
WILLY: Well, sure.
HOWARD: Oh, yeah, yeah. I remember. Well, I couldn’t think of

anything for you, Willy.
WILLY: I tell ya, Howard. The kids are all grown up, y’know. I

don’t need much any more. If I could take home — well, sixty-
five dollars a week, I could swing it.

HOWARD: Yeah, but Willy, see I…
WILLY: I tell ya why. Howard. Speaking frankly and between the

two of us, y’know — I’m just a little tired.
HOWARD: Oh, I could understand that, Willy. But you’re a road

man, Willy, and we do a road business. We’ve only got a half-
dozen salesmen on the floor here.

WILLY: God knows, Howard. I never asked a favor of any man.
But I was with the firm when your father used to carry you in
here in his arms.

HOWARD: I know that, Willy, but…
WILLY: Your father came to me the day you were born and asked

me what I thought of the name of Howard, may he rest in
peace.

HOWARD: I appreciate that, Willy, but there just is no spot here
for you. If I had a spot I’d slam you right in, but I just don’t
have a single solitary spot. (He looks for his lighter. Willy has
picked it up and gives it to him. Pause.)

WILLY (with increasing anger): Howard, all I need to set my table
is fifty dollars a week.

HOWARD: But where am I going to put you, kid?
WILLY: Look, it isn’t a question of whether I can sell merchan-

dise, is it?
HOWARD: No, but it’s a business, kid, and everybody’s gotta pull

his own weight.
WILLY (desperately): Just let me tell you a story. Howard…
HOWARD: ‘Cause you gotta admit, business is business.
WILLY (angrily): Business is definitely business, but just listen

for a minute. You don’t understand this. When I was a boy —
eighteen, nineteen — I was already on the road. And there was
a question in my mind as to whether selling had a future for
me. Because in those days I had a yearning to go to Alaska.
See, there were three gold strikes in one month in Alaska, and
I felt like going out. Just for the ride, you might say.

HOWARD (barely interested): Don’t say.
WILLY: Oh, yeah, my father lived many years in Alaska. He was

an adventurous man. We’ve got quite a little streak of self-
reliance in our family. I thought I’d go out with my older
brother and try to locate him, and maybe settle in the North
with the old man. And I was almost decided to go, when I met a
salesman in the Parker House. His name was Dave Singleman.
And he was eighty-four years old, and he’d drummed mer-
chandise in thirty-one states. And old Dave, he’d go up to his
room, y’understand, put on his green velvet slippers — I’ll
never forget — and pick up his phone and call the buyers, and
without ever leaving his room, at the age of eighty-four, he
made his living. And when I saw that, I realized that selling
was the greatest career a man could want. ‘Cause what could

be more satisfying than to be able to go, at the age of eighty-
four, into twenty or thirty different cities, and pick up a phone,
and be remembered and loved and helped by so many different
people? Do you know? When he died — and by the way he died
the death of a salesman, in his green velvet slippers in the
smoker of the New York, New Haven and Hartford, going into
Boston — when he died, hundreds of salesmen and buyers were
at his funeral. Things were sad on a lotta trains for months af-
ter that. (He stands up. Howard has not looked at him.) In
those days there was personality in it, Howard. There was re-
spect, and comradeship, and gratitude in it. Today, it’s all cut
and dried, and there’s no chance for bringing friendship to bear
— or personality. You see what I mean? They don’t know me
any more.

HOWARD (moving away, to the right): That’s just the thing,
Willy.

WILLY: If I had forty dollars a week — that’s all I’d need. Forty
dollars, Howard.

HOWARD: Kid, I can’t take blood from a stone, I…
WILLY (desperation is on him now): Howard, the year Al Smith

was nominated, your father came to me and…
HOWARD (starting to go off): I’ve got to see some people, kid.
WILLY (stopping him). I’m talking about your father! There were

promises made across this desk! You mustn’t tell me you’ve got
people to see — I put thirty-four years into this firm, Howard,
and now I can’t pay my insurance! You can’t eat the orange
and throw the peel away — a man is not a piece of fruit! (After
a pause.) Now pay attention. Your father — in 1928 I had a big
year. I averaged a hundred and seventy dollars a week in com-
missions.

HOWARD (impatiently): Now, Willy, you never averaged…
WILLY (banging his hand on the desk): I averaged a hundred and

seventy dollars a week in the year of 1928! And your father
came to me — or rather, I was in the office here — it was right
over this desk — and he put his hand on my shoulder…

HOWARD (getting up): You’ll have to excuse me, Willy, I gotta see
some people. Pull yourself together. (Going out.) I’ll be back in
a little while. (On Howard’s exit, the light on his chair grows

very bright and strange.)

WILLY: Pull myself together! What the hell did I say to him? My
God, I was yelling at him! How could I? (Willy breaks off, star-
ing at the light, which occupies the chair, animating it. He ap-
proaches this chair, standing across the desk from it.) Frank,
Frank, don’t you remember what you told me that time? How
you put your hand on my shoulder, and Frank… (He leans on
the desk and as he speaks the dead man’s name he accidentally
switches on the recorder, and instantly)

HOWARD’S SON: »… of New York is Albany. The capital of Ohio
is Cincinnati, the capital of Rhode Island is…« (The recitation
continues.)

WILLY (leaping away with fright, shouting): Ha, Howard! How-
ard! Howard!

HOWARD (rushing in): What happened?
WILLY (pointing at the machine, which continues nasally, child-

ishly, with the capital cities): Shut it off! Shut it off!
HOWARD (pulling the plug out): Look, Willy…
WILLY (pressing his hands to his eyes): I gotta get myself some

coffee. I’ll get some coffee… (Willy starts to walk out. Howard
stops him.)

HOWARD (rolling up the cord): Willy, look…
WILLY: I’ll go to Boston.
HOWARD: Willy, you can’t go to Boston for us.
WILLY: Why can’t I go?
HOWARD: I don’t want you to represent us. I’ve been meaning to

tell you for a long time now.
WILLY: Howard, are you firing me?
HOWARD: I think you need a good long rest, Willy.
WILLY: Howard…
HOWARD: And when you feel better, come back, and we’ll see if

we can work something out.
WILLY: But I gotta earn money, Howard. I’m in no position to…
HOWARD: Where are your sons? Why don’t your sons give you a

hand?
WILLY: They’re working on a very big deal.

HOWARD: This is no time for false pride, Willy. You go to your
sons and you tell them that you’re tired. You’ve got two great
boys, haven’t you?

WILLY: Oh, no question, no question, but in the meantime…
HOWARD: Then that’s that, heh?
WILLY: All right, I’ll go to Boston tomorrow.
HOWARD: No, no.
WILLY: I can’t throw myself on my sons. I’m not a cripple!
HOWARD: Look, kid, I’m busy this morning.
WILLY (grasping Howard’s arm): Howard, you’ve got to let me go

to Boston!
HOWARD (hard, keeping himself under control): I’ve got a line of

people to see this morning. Sit down, take five minutes, and
pull yourself together, and then go home, will ya? I need the of-
fice, Willy. (He starts to go, turns, remembering the recorder,
starts to push off the table holding the recorder.) Oh, yeah.
Whenever you can this week, stop by and drop off the samples.
You’ll feel better, Willy, and then come back and we’ll talk.
Pull yourself together, kid, there’s people outside. (Howard ex-
its, pushing the table off left. Willy stares into space, exhausted.
Now the music is heard — Ben’s music — first distantly, then
closer, closer. As Willy speaks, Ben enters from the right. He
carries valise and umbrella.)

WILLY: Oh, Ben, how did you do it? What is the answer? Did you
wind up the Alaska deal already?

BEN: Doesn’t take much time if you know what you’re doing.
Just a short business trip. Boarding ship in an hour. Wanted to
say good-by.

WILLY: Ben, I’ve got to talk to you.
BEN (glancing at his watch): Haven’t the time, William.
WILLY (crossing the apron to Ben): Ben, nothing’s working out. I

don’t know what to do.
BEN: Now, look here, William. I’ve bought timberland in Alaska

and I need a man to look after things for me.
WILLY: God, timberland! Me and my boys in those grand out-

doors?
BEN: You’ve a new continent at your doorstep, William. Get out

of these cities, they’re full of talk and time payments and
courts of law. Screw on your fists and you can fight for a for-
tune up there.

WILLY: Yes, yes! Linda, Linda!

(Linda enters as of old, with the wash.)

LINDA: Oh, you’re back?
BEN: I haven’t much time.
WILLY: No, wait! Linda, he’s got a proposition for me in Alaska.
LINDA: But you’ve got… (To Ben.) He’s got a beautiful job here.
WILLY: But in Alaska, kid, I could…
LINDA: You’re doing well enough, Willy!
BEN (to Linda): Enough for what, my dear?
LINDA (frightened of Ben and angry at him): Don’t say those

things to him! Enough to be happy right here, right now. (To
Willy, while Ben laughs.) Why must everybody conquer the
world? You’re well liked, and the boys love you, and someday
— (To Ben) — why, old man Wagner told him just the other
day that if he keeps it up he’ll be a member of the firm, didn’t
he, Willy?

WILLY: Sure, sure. I am building something with this firm, Ben,
and if a man is building something he must be on the right
track, mustn’t he?

BEN: What are you building? Lay your hand on it. Where is it?
WILLY (hesitantly): That’s true, Linda, there’s nothing.
LINDA: Why? (To Ben.) There’s a man eighty-four years old –
WILLY: That’s right, Ben, that’s right. When I look at that man I

say, what is there to worry about?
BEN: Bah!
WILLY: It’s true, Ben. All he has to do is go into any city, pick up

the phone, and he’s making his living and you know why?
BEN (picking up his valise): I’ve got to go.
WILLY (holding Ben back): Look at this boy!

(Biff, in his high school sweater, enters carrying suitcase.
Happy carries Biffs shoulder guards, gold helmet, and football
pants.)

WILLY: Without a penny to his name, three great universities are
begging for him, and from there the sky’s the limit, because it’s
not what you do, Ben. It’s who you know and the smile on your
face! It’s contacts, Ben, contacts! The whole wealth of Alaska
passes over the lunch table at the Commodore Hotel, and
that’s the wonder, the wonder of this country, that a man can
end with diamonds here on the basis of being liked! (He turns
to Biff.) And that’s why when you get out on that field today
it’s important. Because thousands of people will be rooting for
you and loving you. (To Ben, who has again begun to leave.)
And Ben! When he walks into a business office his name will
sound out like a bell and all the doors will open to him! I’ve
seen it, Ben, I’ve seen it a thousand times! You can’t feel it
with your hand like timber, but it’s there!

BEN: Good-by, William.
WILLY: Ben, am I right? Don’t you think I’m right? I value your

advice.
BEN: There’s a new continent at your doorstep, William. You

could walk out rich. Rich! (He is gone.)
WILLY: We’ll do it here, Ben! You hear me? We’re gonna do it

here!

(Young Bernard rushes in. The gay music of the Boys is heard.)

BERNARD: Oh, gee, I was afraid you left already!
WILLY: Why? What time is it?
BERNARD: It’s half-past one!
WILLY: Well, come on, everybody! Ebbets Field next stop!

Where’s the pennants? (He rushes through the wall-line of the
kitchen and out into the living room.)

LINDA (to Biff): Did you pack fresh underwear?
BIFF (who has been limbering up): I want to go!
BERNARD: Biff, I’m carrying your helmet, ain’t I?
HAPPY: No, I’m carrying the helmet.
BERNARD: Oh, Biff, you promised me.
HAPPY: I’m carrying the helmet.
BERNARD: How am I going to get in the locker room?
LINDA: Let him carry the shoulder guards. (She puts her coat and

hat on in the kitchen.)
BERNARD: Can I, Biff? ‘Cause I told everybody I’m going to be in

the locker room.
HAPPY: In Ebbets Field it’s the clubhouse.
BERNARD: I meant the clubhouse. Biff!
HAPPY: Biff!
BIFF (grandly, after a slight pause): Let him carry the shoulder

guards.
HAPPY (as he gives Bernard the shoulder guards): Stay close to

us now.

(Willy rushes in with the pennants.)

WILLY (handing them out): Everybody wave when Biff comes out
on the field. (Happy and Bernard run off.) You set now, boy?

(The music has died away.)

BIFF: Ready to go, Pop. Every muscle is ready.
WILLY (at the edge of the apron): You realize what this means?
BIFF: That’s right, Pop.
WILLY (feeling Biffs muscles): You’re comin’ home this afternoon

captain of the All-Scholastic Championship Team of the City of
New York.

BIFF: I got it, Pop. And remember, pal, when I take off my hel-
met, that touchdown is for you.

WILLY: Let’s go! (He is starting out, with his arm around Biff,
when Charley enters, as of old, in knickers.) I got no room for
you, Charley.

CHARLEY: Room? For what?
WILLY: In the car.
CHARLEY: You goin’ for a ride? I wanted to shoot some casino.
WILLY (furiously): Casino! (Incredulously.) Don’t you realize

what today is?
LINDA: Oh, he knows, Willy. He’s just kidding you.
WILLY: That’s nothing to kid about!
CHARLEY: No, Linda, what’s goin on?
LINDA: He’s playing in Ebbets Field.

CHARLEY: Baseball in this weather?
WILLY: Don’t talk to him. Come on, come on! (He is pushing

them out.)
CHARLEY: Wait a minute, didn’t you hear the news?
WILLY: What?
CHARLEY: Don’t you listen to the radio? Ebbets Field just blew

up.
WILLY: You go to hell! (Charley laughs. Pushing them out.) Come

on, come on! We’re late.
CHARLEY (as they go): Knock a homer, Biff, knock a homer!
WILLY (the last to leave, turning to Charley): I don’t think that

was funny, Charley. This is the greatest day of his life.
CHARLEY: Willy, when are you going to grow up?
WILLY: Yeah, heh? When this game is over, Charley, you’ll be

laughing out of the other side of your face. They’ll be calling
him another Red Grange. Twenty-five thousand a year.

CHARLEY (kidding): Is that so?
WILLY: Yeah, that’s so.
CHARLEY: Well, then, I’m sorry, Willy. But tell me something.
WILLY: What?
CHARLEY: Who is Red Grange?
WILLY: Put up your hands. Goddam you, put up your hands!

(Charley, chuckling, shakes his head and walks away, around
the left comer of the stage. Willy follows him. The music rises to a
mocking frenzy.)

WILLY: Who the hell do you think you are, better than everybody
else? You don’t know everything, you big, ignorant, stupid…
Put up your hands!

(Light rises, on the right side of the forestage, on a small table
in the reception room of Charley’s office. Traffic sounds are heard.
Bernard, now mature, sits whistling to himself. A pair of tennis
rackets and an overnight bag are on the floor beside him.)

WILLY (offstage): What are you walking away for? Don’t walk
away! If you’re going to say something say it to my face! I know
you laugh at me behind my back. You’ll laugh out of the other

side of your goddam face after this game. Touchdown! Touch-
down! Eighty thousand people! Touchdown! Right between the
goal posts.

(Bernard is a quiet, earnest, but self-assured young man.
Willy’s voice is coming from right upstage now. Bernard lowers his
feet off the table and listens. Jenny, his father’s secretary, enters.)

JENNY (distressed): Say, Bernard, will you go out in the hall?
BERNARD: What is that noise? Who is it?
JENNY: Mr. Loman. He just got off the elevator.
BERNARD (getting up): Who’s he arguing with?
JENNY: Nobody. There’s nobody with him. I can’t deal with him

any more, and your father gets all upset everytime he comes.
I’ve got a lot of typing to do, and your father’s waiting to sign
it. Will you see him?

WILLY (entering): Touchdown! Touch — (He sees Jenny.) Jenny,
Jenny, good to see you. How’re ya? Workin’? Or still honest?

JENNY: Fine. How’ve you been feeling?
WILLY: Not much any more, Jenny. Ha, ha! (He is surprised to

see the rackets.)
BERNARD: Hello, Uncle Willy.
WILLY (almost shocked): Bernard! Well, look who’s here! (He

comes quickly, guiltily, to Bernard and warmly shakes his
hand.)

BERNARD: How are you? Good to see you.
WILLY: What are you doing here?
BERNARD: Oh, just stopped by to see Pop. Get off my feet till my

train leaves. I’m going to Washington in a few minutes.
WILLY: Is he in?
BERNARD: Yes, he’s in his office with the accountant. Sit down.
WILLY (sitting down): What’re you going to do in Washington?
BERNARD: Oh, just a case I’ve got there, Willy.
WILLY: That so? (Indicating the rackets.) You going to play tennis

there?
BERNARD: I’m staying with a friend who’s got a court.
WILLY: Don’t say. His own tennis court. Must be fine people, I

bet.
BERNARD: They are, very nice. Dad tells me Biffs in town.
WILLY (with a big smile): Yeah, Biffs in. Working on a very big

deal, Bernard.
BERNARD: What’s Biff doing?
WILLY: Well, he’s been doing very big things in the West. But he

decided to establish himself here. Very big. We’re having din-
ner. Did I hear your wife had a boy?

BERNARD: That’s right. Our second.
WILLY: Two boys! What do you know!
BERNARD: What kind of a deal has Biff got?
WILLY: Well, Bill Oliver — very big sporting-goods man — he

wants Biff very badly. Called him in from the West. Long dis-
tance, carte blanche, special deliveries. Your friends have their
own private tennis court?

BERNARD: You still with the old firm, Willy?
WILLY (after a pause): I’m — I’m overjoyed to see how you made

the grade, Bernard, overjoyed. It’s an encouraging thing to see
a young man really — really… Looks very good for Biff —
very… (He breaks off, then.) Bernard … (He is so full of emotion,
he breaks off again.)

BERNARD: What is it, Willy?
WILLY (small and alone): What — what’s the secret?
BERNARD: What secret?
WILLY: How — how did you? Why didn’t he ever catch on?
BERNARD: I wouldn’t know that, Willy.
WILLY (confidentially, desperately): You were his friend, his boy-

hood friend. There’s something I don’t understand about it.
His life ended after that Ebbets Field game. From the age of
seventeen nothing good ever happened to him.

BERNARD: He never trained himself for anything.
WILLY: But he did, he did. After high school he took so many

correspondence courses. Radio mechanics; television; God
knows what, and never made the slightest mark.

BERNARD (taking off his glasses): Willy, do you want to talk can-
didly?

WILLY (rising, faces Bernard): I regard you as a very brilliant
man, Bernard. I value your advice.

BERNARD: Oh, the hell with the advice, Willy. I couldn’t advise
you. There’s just one thing I’ve always wanted to ask you.
When he was supposed to graduate, and the math teacher
flunked him…

WILLY: Oh, that son-of-a-bitch ruined his life.
BERNARD: Yeah, but, Willy, all he had to do was go to summer

school and make up that subject.
WILLY: That’s right, that’s right.
BERNARD: Did you tell him not to go to summer school?
WILLY: Me? I begged him to go. I ordered him to go!
BERNARD: Then why wouldn’t he go?
WILLY: Why? Why! Bernard, that question has been trailing me

like a ghost for the last fifteen years. He flunked the subject,
and laid down and died like a hammer hit him!

BERNARD: Take it easy, kid.
WILLY: Let me talk to you — I got nobody to talk to. Bernard,

Bernard, was it my fault? Y’see? It keeps going around in my
mind, maybe I did something to him. I got nothing to give him.

BERNARD: Don’t take it so hard.
WILLY: Why did he lay down? What is the story there? You were

his friend!
BERNARD: Willy, I remember, it was June, and our grades came

out. And he’d flunked math.
WILLY: That son-of-a-bitch!
BERNARD: No, it wasn’t right then. Biff just got very angry, I

remember, and he was ready to enroll in summer school.
WILLY (surprised): He was?
BERNARD: He wasn’t beaten by it at all. But then, Willy, he dis-

appeared from the block for almost a month. And I got the idea
that he’d gone up to New England to see you. Did he have a
talk with you then? (Willy stares in silence.)

BERNARD: Willy?
WILLY (with a strong edge of resentment in his voice): Yeah, he

came to Boston. What about it?

BERNARD: Well, just that when he came back — I’ll never forget
this, it always mystifies me. Because I’d thought so well of Biff,
even though he’d always taken advantage of me. I loved him,
Willy, y’know? And he came back after that month and took
his sneakers — remember those sneakers with »University of
Virginia« printed on them? He was so proud of those, wore
them every day. And he took them down in the cellar, and
burned them up in the furnace. We had a fist fight. It lasted at
least half an hour. Just the two of us, punching each other
down the cellar, and crying right through it. I’ve often thought
of how strange it was that I knew he’d given up his life. What
happened in Boston, Willy? (Willy looks at him as at an in-
truder.)

BERNARD: I just bring it up because you asked me.
WILLY (angrily): Nothing. What do you mean, »What happened?«

What’s that got to do with anything?
BERNARD: Well, don’t get sore.
WILLY: What are you trying to do, blame it on me? If a boy lays

down is that my fault?
BERNARD: Now, Willy, don’t get…
WILLY: Well, don’t — don’t talk to me that way! What does that

mean, »What happened?«

(Charley enters. He is in his vest, and he carries a bottle of bour-
bon.)

CHARLEY: Hey; you’re going to miss that train. (He waves the
bottle.)

BERNARD: Yeah, I’m going. (He takes the bottle.) Thanks, Pop.
(He picks up his rackets and bag.) Good-by, Willy, and don’t
worry about it. You know, »If at first you don’t succeed…«

WILLY: Yes, I believe in that.
BERNARD: But sometimes, Willy, it’s better for a man just to

walk away.
WILLY: Walk away?
BERNARD: That’s right.
WILLY: But if you can’t walk away?
BERNARD (after a slight pause): I guess that’s when it’s tough.

(Extending his hand.) Good-by, Willy.
WILLY (shaking Bernard’s hand): Good-by, boy.
CHARLEY (an arm on Bernard’s shoulder): How do you like this

kid? Gonna argue a case in front of the Supreme Court.
BERNARD (protesting): Pop!
WILLY (genuinely shocked, pained, and happy): No! The Supreme

Court!
BERNARD: I gotta run. ’By, Dad!
CHARLEY: Knock ‘em dead, Bernard!

(Bernard goes off.)

WILLY (as Charley takes out his wallet): The Supreme Court! And
he didn’t even mention it!

CHARLEY (counting out money on the desk): He don’t have to —
he’s gonna do it.

WILLY: And you never told him what to do, did you? You never
took any interest in him.

CHARLEY: My salvation is that I never took any interest in any-
thing. There’s some money — fifty dollars. I got an accountant
inside.

WILLY: Charley, look… (With difficulty.) I got my insurance to
pay. If you can manage it — I need a hundred and ten dollars.

(Charley doesn’t reply for a moment; merely stops moving.)

WILLY: I’d draw it from my bank but Linda would know, and I…
CHARLEY: Sit down, Willy.
WILLY (moving toward the chair): I’m keeping an account of

everything, remember. I’ll pay every penny back. (He sits.)
CHARLEY: Now listen to me, Willy.
WILLY: I want you to know I appreciate…
CHARLEY (sitting down on the table): Willy, what’re you doin’?

What the hell is going on in your head?
WILLY: Why? I’m simply…
CHARLEY: I offered you a job. You make fifty dollars a week, and

I won’t send you on the road.
WILLY: I’ve got a job.

CHARLEY: Without pay? What kind of a job is a job without pay?
(He rises.) Now, look, kid, enough is enough. I’m no genius but
I know when I’m being insulted.

WILLY: Insulted!
CHARLEY: Why don’t you want to work for me?
WILLY: What’s the matter with you? I’ve got a job.
CHARLEY: Then what’re you walkin’ in here every week for?
WILLY (getting up): Well, if you don’t want me to walk in here…
CHARLEY: I’m offering you a job.
WILLY: I don’t want your goddam job!
CHARLEY: When the hell are you going to grow up?
WILLY (furiously): You big ignoramus, if you say that to me again

I’ll rap you one! I don’t care how big you are! (He’s ready to
fight.)

(Pause.)

CHARLEY (kindly, going to him): How much do you need, Willy?
WILLY: Charley, I’m strapped. I’m strapped. I don’t know what

to do. I was just fired.
CHARLEY: Howard fired you?
WILLY: That snotnose. Imagine that? I named him. I named him

Howard.
CHARLEY: Willy, when’re you gonna realize that them things

don’t mean anything? You named him Howard, but you can’t
sell that. The only thing you got in this world is what you can
sell. And the funny thing is that you’re a salesman, and you
don’t know that.

WILLY: I’ve always tried to think otherwise, I guess. I always felt
that if a man was impressive, and well liked, that nothing…

CHARLEY: Why must everybody like you? Who liked J. P. Mor-
gan? Was he impressive? In a Turkish bath he’d look like a
butcher. But with his pockets on he was very well liked. Now
listen, Willy, I know you don’t like me, and nobody can say I’m
in love with you, but I’ll give you a job because — just for the
hell of it, put it that way. Now what do you say?

WILLY: I — I just can’t work for you, Charley.

CHARLEY: What’re you, jealous of me?
WILLY: I can’t work for you, that’s all, don’t ask me why.
CHARLEY (angered, takes out more bills): You been jealous of me

all your life, you damned fool! Here, pay your insurance. (He
puts the money in Willy’s hand.)

WILLY: I’m keeping strict accounts.
CHARLEY: I’ve got some work to do. Take care of yourself. And

pay your insurance.
WILLY (moving to the right): Funny, y’know? After all the high-

ways, and the trains, and the appointments, and the years, you
end up worth more dead than alive.

CHARLEY: Willy, nobody’s worth nothin’ dead. (After a slight
pause.) Did you hear what I said? (Willy stands still, dream-
ing.)

CHARLEY: Willy!
WILLY: Apologize to Bernard for me when you see him. I didn’t

mean to argue with him. He’s a fine boy. They’re all fine boys,
and they’ll end up big — all of them. Someday they’ll all play
tennis together. Wish me luck, Charley. He saw Bill Oliver to-
day.

CHARLEY: Good luck.
WILLY (on the verge of tears): Charley, you’re the only friend I

got. Isn’t that a remarkable thing? (He goes out.)
CHARLEY: Jesus!

(Charley stares after him a moment and follows. All light blacks
out. Suddenly mucous music is heard, and a red glow rises behind
the screen at right. Stanley, a young waiter, appears, carrying a
table, followed by Happy, who is carrying two chairs.)

STANLEY (putting the table down): That’s all right, Mr. Loman, I
can handle it myself. (He turns and takes the chairs from
Happy and places them at the table.)

HAPPY (glancing around): Oh, this is better.
STANLEY: Sure, in the front there you’re in the middle of all

kinds of noise. Whenever you got a party, Mr. Loman, you just
tell me and I’ll put you back here. Y’know, there’s a lotta peo-
ple they don’t like it private, because when they go out they

like to see a lotta action around them because they’re sick and
tired to stay in the house by theirself. But I know you, you
ain’t from Hackensack. You know what I mean?

HAPPY (sitting down): So how’s it coming, Stanley?
STANLEY: Ah, it’s a dog’s life. I only wish during the war they’d a

took me in the Army. I coulda been dead by now.
HAPPY: My brother’s back, Stanley.
STANLEY: Oh, he come back, heh? From the Far West.
HAPPY: Yeah, big cattle man, my brother, so treat him right. And

my father’s coming too.
STANLEY: Oh, your father too!
HAPPY: You got a couple of nice lobsters?
STANLEY: Hundred per cent, big.
HAPPY: I want them with the claws.
STANLEY: Don’t worry, I don’t give you no mice. (Happy laughs.)

How about some wine? It’ll put a head on the meal.
HAPPY: No. You remember, Stanley, that recipe I brought you

from overseas? With the champagne in it?
STANLEY: Oh, yeah, sure. I still got it tacked up yet in the

kitchen. But that’ll have to cost a buck apiece anyways.
HAPPY: That’s all right.
STANLEY: What’d you, hit a number or somethin’?
HAPPY: No, it’s a little celebration. My brother is — I think he

pulled off a big deal today. I think we’re going into business to-
gether.

STANLEY: Great! That’s the best for you. Because a family busi-
ness, you know what I mean? — that’s the best.

HAPPY: That’s what I think.
STANLEY: ‘Cause what’s the difference? Somebody steals? It’s in

the family. Know what I mean? (Sotto voce). Like this bar-
tender here. The boss is goin’ crazy what kinda leak he’s got in
the cash register. You put it in but it don’t come out.

HAPPY (raising his head): Sh!
STANLEY: What?
HAPPY: You notice I wasn’t lookin’ right or left, was I?
STANLEY: No.

HAPPY: And my eyes are closed.
STANLEY: So what’s the…?
HAPPY: Strudel’s comin’.
STANLEY (catching on, looks around): Ah, no, there’s no — (He

breaks off as a furred, lavishly dressed girl enters and sits at
the next table. Both follow her with their eyes.)

STANLEY: Geez, how’d ya know?
HAPPY: I got radar or something. (Staring directly at her profile.)

Oooooooo… Stanley.
STANLEY: I think that’s for you, Mr. Loman.
HAPPY: Look at that mouth. Oh, God. And the binoculars.
STANLEY: Geez, you got a life, Mr. Loman.
HAPPY: Wait on her.
STANLEY (going to the Girl’s table): Would you like a menu,

ma’am?
GIRL: I’m expecting someone, but I’d like a…
HAPPY: Why don’t you bring her — excuse me, miss, do you

mind? I sell champagne, and I’d like you to try my brand. Bring
her a champagne, Stanley.

GIRL: That’s awfully nice of you.
HAPPY: Don’t mention it. It’s all company money. (He laughs.)
GIRL: That’s a charming product to be selling, isn’t it?
HAPPY: Oh, gets to be like everything else. Selling is selling,

y’know.
GIRL: I suppose.
HAPPY: You don’t happen to sell, do you?
GIRL: No, I don’t sell.
HAPPY: Would you object to a compliment from a stranger? You

ought to be on a magazine cover.
GIRL (looking at him a little archly): I have been.

(Stanley comes in with a glass of champagne.)

HAPPY: What’d I say before, Stanley? You see? She’s a cover girl.
STANLEY: Oh, I could see, I could see.
HAPPY (to the Girl): What magazine?

GIRL: Oh, a lot of them. (She takes the drink.) Thank you.
HAPPY: You know what they say in France, don’t you? »Cham-

pagne is the drink of the complexion« — Hya, Biff!

(Biff has entered and sits with Happy.)

BIFF: Hello, kid. Sorry I’m late.
HAPPY: I just got here. Uh, Miss… ?
GIRL: Forsythe.
HAPPY: Miss Forsythe, this is my brother.
BIFF: Is Dad here?
HAPPY: His name is Biff. You might’ve heard of him. Great foot-

ball player.
GIRL: Really? What team?
HAPPY: Are you familiar with football?
GIRL: No, I’m afraid I’m not.
HAPPY: Biff is quarterback with the New York Giants.
GIRL: Well, that is nice, isn’t it? (She drinks.)
HAPPY: Good health.
GIRL: I’m happy to meet you.
HAPPY: That’s my name. Hap. It’s really Harold, but at West

Point they called me Happy.
GIRL (now really impressed): Oh, I see. How do you do? (She

turns her profile.)
BIFF: Isn’t Dad coming?
HAPPY: You want her?
BIFF: Oh, I could never make that.
HAPPY: I remember the time that idea would never come into

your head. Where’s the old confidence, Biff?
BIFF: I just saw Oliver…
HAPPY: Wait a minute. I’ve got to see that old confidence again.

Do you want her? She’s on call.
BIFF: Oh, no. (He turns to look at the Girl.)
HAPPY: I’m telling you. Watch this. (Turning to the Girl.) Honey?

(She turns to him). Are you busy?
GIRL: Well, I am… but I could make a phone call.

HAPPY: Do that, will you, honey? And see if you can get a friend.
We’ll be here for a while. Biff is one of the greatest football
players in the country.

GIRL (standing up): Well, I’m certainly happy to meet you.
HAPPY: Come back soon.
GIRL: I’ll try.
HAPPY: Don’t try, honey, try hard.

(The Girl exits. Stanley follows, shaking his head in bewildered
admiration.)

HAPPY: Isn’t that a shame now? A beautiful girl like that? That’s
why I can’t get married. There’s not a good woman in a thou-
sand. New York is loaded with them, kid!

BIFF: Hap, look…
HAPPY: I told you she was on call!
BIFF (strangely unnerved): Cut it out, will ya? I want to say some-

thing to you.
HAPPY: Did you see Oliver?
BIFF: I saw him all right. Now look, I want to tell Dad a couple of

things and I want you to help me.
HAPPY: What? Is he going to back you?
BIFF: Are you crazy? You’re out of your goddam head, you know

that?
HAPPY: Why? What happened?
BIFF (breathlessly): I did a terrible thing today, Hap. It’s been the

strangest day I ever went through. I’m all numb, I swear.
HAPPY: You mean he wouldn’t see you?
BIFF: Well, I waited six hours for him, see? All day. Kept sending

my name in. Even tried to date his secretary so she’d get me to
him, but no soap.

HAPPY: Because you’re not showin’ the old confidence, Biff. He
remembered you, didn’t he?

BIFF (stopping Happy with a gesture): Finally, about five o’clock,
he comes out. Didn’t remember who I was or anything. I felt
like such an idiot, Hap.

HAPPY: Did you tell him my Florida idea?

BIFF: He walked away. I saw him for one minute. I got so mad I
could’ve torn the walls down! How the hell did I ever get the
idea I was a salesman there? I even believed myself that I’d
been a salesman for him! And then he gave me one look and —
I realized what a ridiculous lie my whole life has been! We’ve
been talking in a dream for fifteen years. I was a shipping
clerk.

HAPPY: What’d you do?
BIFF (with great tension and wonder): Well, he left, see. And the

secretary went out. I was all alone in the waiting room. I don’t
know what came over me, Hap. The next thing I know I’m in
his office — paneled walls, everything. I can’t explain it. I —
Hap, I took his fountain pen.

HAPPY: Geez, did he catch you?
BIFF: I ran out. I ran down all eleven flights. I ran and ran and

ran.
HAPPY: That was an awful dumb — what’d you do that for?
BIFF (agonized): I don’t know, I just — wanted to take something,

I don’t know. You gotta help me, Hap, I’m gonna tell Pop.
HAPPY: You crazy? What for?
BIFF: Hap, he’s got to understand that I’m not the man some-

body lends that kind of money to. He thinks I’ve been spiting
him all these years and it’s eating him up.

HAPPY: That’s just it. You tell him something nice.
BIFF: I can’t.
HAPPY: Say you got a lunch date with Oliver tomorrow.
BIFF: So what do I do tomorrow?
HAPPY: You leave the house tomorrow and come back at night

and say Oliver is thinking it over. And he thinks it over for a
couple of weeks, and gradually it fades away and nobody’s the
worse.

BIFF: But it’ll go on forever!
HAPPY: Dad is never so happy as when he’s looking forward to

something!

(Willy enters.)

HAPPY: Hello, scout!

WILLY: Gee, I haven’t been here in years!

(Stanley has followed Willy in and sets a chair for him. Stanley
starts off but Happy stops him.)

HAPPY: Stanley!

(Stanley stands by, waiting for an order.)

BIFF (going to Willy with guilt, as to an invalid): Sit down, Pop.
You want a drink?

WILLY: Sure, I don’t mind.
BIFF: Let’s get a load on.
WILLY: You look worried.
BIFF: N-no. (To Stanley.) Scotch all around. Make it doubles.
STANLEY: Doubles, right. (He goes.)
WILLY: You had a couple already, didn’t you?
BIFF: Just a couple, yeah.
WILLY: Well, what happened, boy? (Nodding affirmatively, with a

smile.) Everything go all right?
BIFF (takes a breath, then reaches out and grasps Willy’s hand):

Pal… (He is smiling bravely, and Willy is smiling too.) I had an
experience today.

HAPPY: Terrific, Pop.
WILLY: That so? What happened?
BIFF (high, slightly alcoholic, above the earth): I’m going to tell

you everything from first to last. It’s been a strange day. (Si-
lence. He looks around, composes himself as best he can, but his
breath keeps breaking the rhythm of his voice.) I had to wait
quite a while for him, and…

WILLY: Oliver?
BIFF: Yeah, Oliver. All day, as a matter of cold fact. And a lot of-

instances — facts, Pop, facts about my life came back to me.
Who was it, Pop? Who ever said I was a salesman with Oliver?

WILLY: Well, you were.
BIFF: No, Dad, I was a shipping clerk.
WILLY: But you were practically…
BIFF (with determination): Dad, I don’t know who said it first,

but I was never a salesman for Bill Oliver.
WILLY: What’re you talking about?
BIFF: Let’s hold on to the facts tonight, Pop. We’re not going to

get anywhere bullin’ around. I was a shipping clerk.
WILLY (angrily): All right, now listen to me…
BIFF: Why don’t you let me finish?
WILLY: I’m not interested in stories about the past or any crap of

that kind because the woods are burning, boys, you under-
stand? There’s a big blaze going on all around. I was fired to-
day.

BIFF (shocked): How could you be?
WILLY: I was fired, and I’m looking for a little good news to tell

your mother, because the woman has waited and the woman
has suffered. The gist of it is that I haven’t got a story left in
my head, Biff. So don’t give me a lecture about facts and as-
pects. I am not interested. Now what’ve you got to say to me?
(Stanley enters with three drinks. They wait until he leaves.)

WILLY: Did you see Oliver?
BIFF: Jesus, Dad!
WILLY: You mean you didn’t go up there?
HAPPY: Sure he went up there.
BIFF: I did. I — saw him. How could they fire you?
WILLY (on the edge of his chair): What kind of a welcome did he

give you?
BIFF: He won’t even let you work on commission?
WILLY: I’m out! (Driving.) So tell me, he gave you a warm wel-

come?
HAPPY: Sure, Pop, sure!
BIFF (driven): Well, it was kind of…
WILLY: I was wondering if he’d remember you. (To Happy.)

Imagine, man doesn’t see him for ten, twelve years and gives
him that kind of a welcome!

HAPPY: Damn right!
BIFF (trying to return to the offensive): Pop, look…
WILLY: You know why he remembered you, don’t you? Because

you impressed him in those days.

BIFF: Let’s talk quietly and get this down to the facts, huh?
WILLY (as though Biff had been interrupting): Well, what hap-

pened? It’s great news, Biff. Did he take you into his office or’d
you talk in the waiting room?

BIFF: Well, he came in, see, and…
WILLY (with a big smile): What’d he say? Betcha he threw his

arm around you.
BIFF: Well, he kinda…
WILLY: He’s a fine man. (To Happy.) Very hard man to see,

y’know.
HAPPY (agreeing): Oh, I know.
WILLY (to Biff): Is that where you had the drinks?
BIFF: Yeah, he gave me a couple of — no, no!
HAPPY (cutting in): He told him my Florida idea.
WILLY: Don’t interrupt. (To Biff) How’d he react to the Florida

idea?
BIFF: Dad, will you give me a minute to explain?
WILLY: I’ve been waiting for you to explain since I sat down here!

What happened? He took you into his office and what?
BIFF: Well — I talked. And — and he listened, see.
WILLY: Famous for the way he listens, y’know. What was his

answer?
BIFF: His answer was — (He breaks off, suddenly angry.) Dad,

you’re not letting me tell you what I want to tell you!
WILLY (accusing, angered): You didn’t see him, did you?
BIFF: I did see him!
WILLY: What’d you insult him or something? You insulted him,

didn’t you?
BIFF: Listen, will you let me out of it, will you just let me out of

it!
HAPPY: What the hell!
WILLY: Tell me what happened!
BIFF (to Happy): I can’t talk to him!

(A single trumpet note jars the ear. The light of green leaves
stains the house, which holds, the air of night and a dream. Young

Bernard enters and knocks on the door of the house.)

YOUNG BERNARD (frantically): Mrs. Loman, Mrs. Loman!
HAPPY: Tell him what happened!
BIFF (to Happy): Shut up and leave me alone!
WILLY: No, no! You had to go and flunk math!
BIFF: What math? What’re you talking about?
YOUNG BERNARD: Mrs. Loman, Mrs. Loman!

(Linda appears in the house, as of old.)

WILLY (wildly): Math, math, math!
BIFF: Take it easy, Pop!
YOUNG BERNARD: Mrs. Loman!
WILLY (furiously): If you hadn’t flunked you’d’ve been set by

now!
BIFF: Now, look, I’m gonna tell you what happened, and you’re

going to listen to me.
YOUNG BERNARD: Mrs. Loman!
BIFF: I waited six hours…
HAPPY: What the hell are you saying?
BIFF: I kept sending in my name but he wouldn’t see me. So fi-

nally he… (He continues unheard as light fades low on the res-
taurant.)

YOUNG BERNARD: Biff flunked math!
LINDA: No!
YOUNG BERNARD: Birnbaum flunked him! They won’t graduate

him!
LINDA: But they have to. He’s gotta go to the university. Where

is he? Biff! Biff!
YOUNG BERNARD: No, he left. He went to Grand Central.
LINDA: Grand — You mean he went to Boston!
YOUNG BERNARD: Is Uncle Willy in Boston?
LINDA: Oh, maybe Willy can talk to the teacher. Oh, the poor,

poor boy!

(Light on house area snaps out.)

BIFF (at the table, now audible, holding up a gold fountain pen):…
so I’m washed up with Oliver, you understand? Are you listen-
ing to me?

WILLY (at a loss): Yeah, sure. If you hadn’t flunked…
BIFF: Flunked what? What’re you talking about?
WILLY: Don’t blame everything on me! I didn’t flunk math —

you did! What pen?
HAPPY: That was awful dumb, Biff, a pen like that is worth —
WILLY (seeing the pen for the first time): You took Oliver’s pen?
BIFF (weakening): Dad, I just explained it to you.
WILLY: You stole Bill Oliver’s fountain pen!
BIFF: I didn’t exactly steal it! That’s just what I’ve been explain-

ing to you!
HAPPY: He had it in his hand and just then Oliver walked in, so

he got nervous and stuck it in his pocket!
WILLY: My God, Biff!
BIFF: I never intended to do it, Dad!
OPERATOR’S VOICE: Standish Arms, good evening!
WILLY (shouting): I’m not in my room!
BIFF (frightened): Dad, what’s the matter? (He and Happy stand

up.)
OPERATOR: Ringing Mr. Loman for you!
WILLY: I’m not there, stop it!
BIFF (horrified, gets down on one knee before Willy): Dad, I’ll

make good, I’ll make good. (Willy tries to get to his feet. Biff
holds him down.) Sit down now.

WILLY: No, you’re no good, you’re no good for anything.
BIFF: I am, Dad, I’ll find something else, you understand? Now

don’t worry about anything. (He holds up Willy’s face.) Talk to
me, Dad.

OPERATOR: Mr. Loman does not answer. Shall I page him?
WILLY (attempting to stand, as though to rush and silence the

Operator): No, no, no!
HAPPY: He’ll strike something, Pop.
WILLY: No, no…

BIFF (desperately, standing over Willy): Pop, listen! Listen to me!
I’m telling you something good. Oliver talked to his partner
about the Florida idea. You listening? He — he talked to his
partner, and he came to me… I’m going to be all right, you
hear? Dad, listen to me, he said it was just a question of the
amount!

WILLY: Then you… got it?
HAPPY: He’s gonna be terrific, Pop!
WILLY (trying to stand): Then you got it, haven’t you? You got it!

You got it!
BIFF (agonized, holds Willy down): No, no. Look, Pop. I’m sup-

posed to have lunch with them tomorrow. I’m just telling you
this so you’ll know that I can still make an impression, Pop.
And I’ll make good somewhere, but I can’t go tomorrow, see?

WILLY: Why not? You simply…
BIFF: But the pen, Pop!
WILLY: You give it to him and tell him it was an oversight!
HAPPY: Sure, have lunch tomorrow!
BIFF: I can’t say that…
WILLY: You were doing a crossword puzzle and accidentally used

his pen!
BIFF: Listen, kid, I took those balls years ago, now I walk in with

his fountain pen? That clinches it, don’t you see? I can’t face
him like that! I’ll try elsewhere.

PAGE’S VOICE: Paging Mr. Loman!
WILLY: Don’t you want to be anything?
BIFF: Pop, how can I go back?
WILLY: You don’t want to be anything, is that what’s behind it?
BIFF (now angry at Willy for not crediting his sympathy): Don’t

take it that way! You think it was easy walking into that office
after what I’d done to him? A team of horses couldn’t have
dragged me back to Bill Oliver!

WILLY: Then why’d you go?
BIFF: Why did I go? Why did I go! Look at you! Look at what’s

become of you!

(Off left, The Woman laughs.)

WILLY: Biff, you’re going to go to that lunch tomorrow, or…
BIFF: I can’t go. I’ve got no appointment!
HAPPY: Biff, for… !
WILLY: Are you spiting me?
BIFF: Don’t take it that way! Goddammit!
WILLY (strikes Biff and falters away from the table): You rotten

little louse! Are you spiting me?
THE WOMAN: Someone’s at the door, Willy!
BIFF: I’m no good, can’t you see what I am?
HAPPY (separating them): Hey, you’re in a restaurant! Now cut it

out, both of you! (The girls enter.) Hello, girls, sit down.

(The Woman laughs, off left.)

MISS FORSYTHE: I guess we might as well. This is Letta.
THE WOMAN: Willy, are you going to wake up?
BIFF (ignoring Willy): How’re ya, miss, sit down. What do you

drink?
MISS FORSYTHE: Letta might not be able to stay long.
LETTA: I gotta get up very early tomorrow. I got jury duty. I’m so

excited! Were you fellows ever on a jury?
BIFF: No, but I been in front of them! (The girls laugh.) This is

my father.
LETTA: Isn’t he cute? Sit down with us, Pop.
HAPPY: Sit him down, Biff!
BIFF (going to him): Come on, slugger, drink us under the table.

To hell with it! Come on, sit down, pal.

(On Biffs last insistence, Willy is about to sit.)

THE WOMAN (now urgently): Willy are you going to answer the
door!

(The Woman’s call pulls Willy back. He starts right, befuddled.)

BIFF: Hey, where are you going?
WILLY: Open the door.
BIFF: The door?

WILLY: The washroom… the door… where’s the door?
BIFF (leading Willy to the left): Just go straight down.

(Willy moves left.)

THE WOMAN: Willy, Willy, are you going to get up, get up, get
up, get up?

(Willy exits left.)

LETTA: I think it’s sweet you bring your daddy along.
MISS FORSYTHE: Oh, he isn’t really your father!
BIFF (at left, turning to her resentfully): Miss Forsythe, you’ve

just seen a prince walk by. A fine, troubled prince. A hard-
working, unappreciated prince. A pal, you understand? A good
companion. Always for his boys.

LETTA: That’s so sweet.
HAPPY: Well, girls, what’s the program? We’re wasting time.

Come on, Biff. Gather round. Where would you like to go?
BIFF: Why don’t you do something for him?
HAPPY: Me!
BIFF: Don’t you give a damn for him, Hap?
HAPPY: What’re you talking about? I’m the one who —
BIFF: I sense it, you don’t give a good goddam about him. (He

takes the rolled-up hose from his pocket and puts it on the table
in front of Happy.) Look what I found in the cellar, for Christ’s
sake. How can you bear to let it go on?

HAPPY: Me? Who goes away? Who runs off and —
BIFF: Yeah, but he doesn’t mean anything to you. You could help

him — I can’t! Don’t you understand what I’m talking about?
He’s going to kill himself, don’t you know that?

HAPPY: Don’t I know it! Me!
BIFF: Hap, help him! Jesus… help him… Help me, help me, I can’t

bear to look at his face! (Ready to weep, he hurries out, up
right.)

HAPPY (starting after him): Where are you going?
MISS FORSYTHE: What’s he so mad about? HAPPY: Come on,

girls, we’ll catch up with him.

MISS FORSYTHE (as Happy pushes her out): Say, I don’t like
that temper of his!

HAPPY: He’s just a little overstrung, he’ll be all right!
WILLY (off left, as The Woman laughs): Don’t answer! Don’t an-

swer!
LETTA: Don’t you want to tell your father…
HAPPY: No, that’s not my father. He’s just a guy. Come on, we’ll

catch Biff, and, honey, we’re going to paint this town! Stanley,
where’s the check! Hey, Stanley!

(They exit. Stanley looks toward left.)

STANLEY (calling to Happy indignantly): Mr. Loman! Mr. Lo-
man!

(Stanley picks up a chair and follows them off. Knocking is
heard off left. The Woman enters, laughing. Willy follows her. She
is in a black slip; he is buttoning his shirt. Raw, sensuous music
accompanies their speech)

WILLY: Will you stop laughing? Will you stop?
THE WOMAN: Aren’t you going to answer the door? He’ll wake

the whole hotel.
WILLY: I’m not expecting anybody.
THE WOMAN: Whyn’t you have another drink, honey, and stop

being so damn self-centered?
WILLY: I’m so lonely.
THE WOMAN: You know you ruined me, Willy? From now on,

whenever you come to the office, I’ll see that you go right
through to the buyers. No waiting at my desk anymore, Willy.
You ruined me.

WILLY: That’s nice of you to say that.
THE WOMAN: Gee, you are self-centered! Why so sad? You are

the saddest, self-centeredest soul I ever did see-saw. (She
laughs. He kisses her.) Come on inside, drummer boy. It’s silly
to be dressing in the middle of the night. (As knocking is
heard.) Aren’t you going to answer the door?

WILLY: They’re knocking on the wrong door.
THE WOMAN: But I felt the knocking. And he heard us talking

in here. Maybe the hotel’s on fire!
WILLY (his terror rising): It’s a mistake.
THE WOMAN: Then tell him to go away!
WILLY: There’s nobody there.
THE WOMAN: It’s getting on my nerves, Willy. There’s some-

body standing out there and it’s getting on my nerves!
WILLY (pushing her away from him): All right, stay in the bath-

room here, and don’t come out. I think there’s a law in Massa-
chusetts about it, so don’t come out. It may be that new room
clerk. He looked very mean. So don’t come out. It’s a mistake,
there’s no fire.

(The knocking is heard again. He takes a few steps away from
her, and she vanishes into the wing. The light follows him, and
now he is facing Young Biff, who carries a suitcase. Biff steps to-
ward him. The music is gone.)

BIFF: Why didn’t you answer?
WILLY: Biff! What are you doing in Boston?
BIFF: Why didn’t you answer? I’ve been knocking for five min-

utes, I called you on the phone…
WILLY: I just heard you. I was in the bathroom and had the door

shut. Did anything happen home?
BIFF: Dad — I let you down.
WILLY: What do you mean?
BIFF: Dad…
WILLY: Biffo, what’s this about? (Putting his arm around Biff.)

Come on, let’s go downstairs and get you a malted.
BIFF: Dad, I flunked math.
WILLY: Not for the term?
BIFF: The term. I haven’t got enough credits to graduate.
WILLY: You mean to say Bernard wouldn’t give you the answers?
BIFF: He did, he tried, but I only got a sixty-one.
WILLY: And they wouldn’t give you four points?
BIFF: Birnbaum refused absolutely. I begged him, Pop, but he

won’t give me those points. You gotta talk to him before they
close the school. Because if he saw the kind of man you are,

and you just talked to him in your way, I’m sure he’d come
through for me. The class came right before practice, see, and I
didn’t go enough. Would you talk to him? He’d like you, Pop.
You know the way you could talk.

WILLY: You’re on. We’ll drive right back.
BIFF: Oh, Dad, good work! I’m sure he’ll change it for you!
WILLY: Go downstairs and tell the clerk I’m checkin’ out. Go

right down.
BIFF: Yes, sir! See, the reason he hates me, Pop — one day he was

late for class so I got up at the blackboard and imitated him. I
crossed my eyes and talked with a lithp.

WILLY (laughing): You did? The kids like it?
BIFF: They nearly died laughing!
WILLY: Yeah? What’d you do?
BIFF: The thquare root of thixthy twee is… (Willy bursts out

laughing; Biff joins him.) And in the middle of it he walked in!
(Willy laughs and The Woman joins in offstage.)

WILLY (without hesitation): Hurry downstairs and…
BIFF: Somebody in there?
WILLY: No, that was next door. (The Woman laughs offstage.)
BIFF: Somebody got in your bathroom!
WILLY: No, it’s the next room, there’s a party —
THE WOMAN (enters, laughing; she lisps this): Can I come in?

There’s something in the bathtub, Willy, and it’s moving!
(Willy looks at Biff, who is staring open-mouthed and horrified
at The Woman.)

WILLY: Ah — you better go back to your room. They must be
finished painting by now. They’re painting her room so I let
her take a shower here. Go back, go back… (He pushes her.)

THE WOMAN (resisting): But I’ve got to get dressed, Willy, I
can’t —

WILLY: Get out of here! Go back, go back… (Suddenly striding for
the ordinary.) This is Miss Francis, Biff, she’s a buyer. They’re
painting her room. Go back, Miss Francis, go back…

THE WOMAN: But my clothes, I can’t go out naked in the hall!
WILLY (pushing her offstage): Get outa here! Go back, go back!

(Biff slowly sits down on his suitcase as the argument continues
offstage.)

THE WOMAN: Where’s my stockings? You promised me stock-
ings, Willy!

WILLY: I have no stockings here!
THE WOMAN: You had two boxes of size nine sheers for me, and

I want them!
WILLY: Here, for God’s sake, will you get outa here!
THE WOMAN (enters holding a box of stockings): I just hope

there’s nobody in the hall. That’s all I hope. (To Biff.) Are you
football or baseball?

BIFF: Football.
THE WOMAN (angry, humiliated): That’s me too. G’night. (She

snatches her clothes from Willy, and walks out.)
WILLY (after a pause): Well, better get going. I want to get to the

school first thing in the morning. Get my suits out of the
closet. I’ll get my valise. (Biff doesn’t move.) What’s the matter!
(Biff remains motionless, tears falling.) She’s a buyer. Buys for
J. H. Simmons. She lives down the hall — they’re painting.
You don’t imagine — (He breaks off. After a pause.) Now listen,
pal, she’s just a buyer. She sees merchandise in her room and
they have to keep it looking just so… (Pause. Assuming com-
mand.) All right, get my suits. (Biff doesn’t move.) Now stop
crying and do as I say. I gave you an order. Biff, I gave you an
order! Is that what you do when I give you an order? How dare
you cry! (Putting his arm around Biff.) Now look, Biff, when
you grow up you’ll understand about these things. You mustn’t
— you mustn’t overemphasize a thing like this. I’ll see Birn-
baum first thing in the morning.

BIFF: Never mind.
WILLY (getting down beside Biff): Never mind! He’s going to give

you those points. I’ll see to it.
BIFF: He wouldn’t listen to you.
WILLY: He certainly will listen to me. You need those points for

the U. of Virginia.
BIFF: I’m not going there.
WILLY: Heh? If I can’t get him to change that mark you’ll make

it up in summer school. You’ve got all summer to —
BIFF (his weeping breaking from him): Dad…
WILLY (infected by it): Oh, my boy…
BIFF: Dad…
WILLY: She’s nothing to me, Biff. I was lonely, I was terrible

lonely.
BIFF: You — you gave her Mama’s stockings! (His tears break

through and he rises to go.)
WILLY (grabbing for Biff): I gave you an order!
BIFF: Don’t touch me, you — liar!
WILLY: Apologize for that!
BIFF: You fake! You phony little fake! You fake! (Overcome, he

turns quickly and weeping fully goes out with his suitcase.
Willy is left on the floor on his knees.)

WILLY: I gave you an order! Biff, come back here or I’ll beat you!
Come back here! I’ll whip you!

(Stanley comes quickly in from the right and stands in front of
Willy.)

WILLY (shouts at Stanley): I gave you an order…
STANLEY: Hey, let’s pick it up, pick it up, Mr. Loman. (He helps

Willy to his feet.) Your boys left with the chippies. They said
they’ll see you home.

(A second waiter watches some distance away.)

WILLY: But we were supposed to have dinner together.

(Music is heard, Willy’s theme.)

STANLEY: Can you make it?
WILLY: I’ll — sure, I can make it. (Suddenly concerned about his

clothes.) Do I — I look all right?
STANLEY: Sure, you look all right. (He flicks a speck off Willy’s

lapel.)
WILLY: Here — here’s a dollar.
STANLEY: Oh, your son paid me. It’s all right.
WILLY (putting it in Stanley’s hand): No, take it. You’re a good

boy.
STANLEY: Oh, no, you don’t have to…
WILLY: Here — here’s some more, I don’t need it any more. (Af-

ter a slight pause.) Tell me — is there a seed store in the
neighborhood?

STANLEY: Seeds? You mean like to plant?

(As Willy turns, Stanley slips the money back into his jacket
pocket.)

WILLY: Yes. Carrots, peas…
STANLEY: Well, there’s hardware stores on Sixth Avenue, but it

may be too late now.
WILLY (anxiously): Oh, I’d better hurry. I’ve got to get some

seeds. (He starts off to the right.) I’ve got to get some seeds,
right away. Nothing’s planted. I don’t have a thing in the
ground.

(Willy hurries out as the light goes down. Stanley moves over to
the right after him, watches him off. The other waiter has been
staring at Willy.)

STANLEY (to the waiter): Well, whatta you looking at?

(The waiter picks up the chairs and moves off right. Stanley
takes the table and follows him. The light fades on this area. There
is a long pause, the sound of the flute corning over. The light
gradually rises on the kitchen, which is empty. Happy appears at
the door of the house, followed by Biff. Happy is carrying a large
bunch of long-stemmed roses. He enters the kitchen, looks around
for Linda. Not seeing her, he turns to Biff, who is just outside the
house door, and makes a gesture with his hands, indicating »Not
here, I guess.« He looks into the living room and freezes. Inside,
Linda, unseen is seated, Willy’s coat on her lap. She rises omi-
nously and quietly and moves toward Happy, who backs up into
the kitchen, afraid.)

HAPPY: Hey, what’re you doing up? (Linda says nothing but
moves toward him implacably.) Where’s Pop? (He keeps back-
ing to the right and now Linda is in full view in the doorway to
the living room.) Is he sleeping?

LINDA: Where were you?
HAPPY (trying to laugh it off): We met two girls, Mom, very fine

types. Here, we brought you some flowers. (Offering them to
her.) Put them in your room, Ma.

(She knocks them to the floor at Biff’s feet. He has now come in-
side and closed the door behind him. She stares at Biff, silent.)

HAPPY: Now what’d you do that for? Mom, I want you to have
some flowers…

LINDA (cutting Happy off, violently to Biff): Don’t you care
whether he lives or dies?

HAPPY (going to the stairs): Come upstairs, Biff.
BIFF (with a flare of disgust, to Happy): Go away from me! (To

Linda.) What do you mean, lives or dies? Nobody’s dying
around here, pal.

LINDA: Get out of my sight! Get out of here!
BIFF: I wanna see the boss.
LINDA: You’re not going near him!
BIFF: Where is he? (He moves into the living room and Linda

follows.)
LINDA (shouting after Biff): You invite him for dinner. He looks

forward to it all day — (Biff appears in his parent’s bedroom,
looks around, and exits) — and then you desert him there.
There’s no stranger you’d do that to!

HAPPY: Why? He had a swell time with us. Listen, when I —
(Linda comes back into the kitchen) — desert him I hope I don’t
outlive the day!

LINDA: Get out of here!
HAPPY: Now look, Mom…
LINDA: Did you have to go to women tonight? You and your lousy

rotten whores!

(Biff re-enters the kitchen.)

HAPPY: Mom, all we did was follow Biff around trying to cheer
him up! (To Biff.) Boy, what a night you gave me!

LINDA: Get out of here, both of you, and don’t come back! I don’t
want you tormenting him any more. Go on now, get your

things together! (To Biff.) You can sleep in his apartment. (She
starts to pick up the flowers and stops herself.) Pick up this
stuff, I’m not your maid any more. Pick it up, you bum, you!

(Happy turns his back to her in refusal. Biff slowly moves over
and gets down on his knees, picking up the flowers.)

LINDA: You’re a pair of animals! Not one, not another living soul
would have had the cruelty to walk out on the man in a restau-
rant!

BIFF (not looking at her): Is that what he said?
LINDA: He didn’t have to say anything. He was so humiliated he

nearly limped when he came in.
HAPPY: But, Mom, he had a great time with us…
BIFF (cutting him off violently): Shut up!

(Without another word, Happy goes upstairs.)

LINDA: You! You didn’t even go in to see if he was all right!
BIFF (still on the floor in front of Linda, the flowers in his hand;

with self-loathing): No. Didn’t. Didn’t do a damned thing. How
do you like that, heh? Left him babbling in a toilet.

LINDA: You louse. You…
BIFF: Now you hit it on the nose! (He gets up, throws the flowers

in the wastebasket.) The scum of the earth, and you’re looking
at him!

LINDA: Get out of here!
BIFF: I gotta talk to the boss, Mom. Where is he?
LINDA: You’re not going near him. Get out of this house!
BIFF (with absolute assurance, determination): No. We’re gonna

have an abrupt conversation, him and me.
LINDA: You’re not talking to him.

(Hammering is heard from outside the house, off right. Biff
turns toward the noise.)

LINDA (suddenly pleading): Will you please leave him alone?
BIFF: What’s he doing out there?
LINDA: He’s planting the garden!
BIFF (quietly): Now? Oh, my God!

(Biff moves outside, Linda following. The light dies down on
them and comes up on the center of the apron as Willy walks into
it. He is carrying a flashlight, a hoe, and a handful of seed packets.
He raps the top of the hoe sharply to fix it firmly, and then moves to
the left, measuring off the distance with his foot. He holds the
flashlight to look at the seed packets, reading off the instructions.
He is in the blue of night.)

WILLY: Carrots… quarter-inch apart. Rows… one-foot rows. (He
measures it off.) One foot. (He puts down a package and meas-
ures off.) Beets. (He puts down another package and measures
again.) Lettuce. (He reads the package, puts it down.) One foot
— (He breaks off as Ben appears at the right and moves slowly
down to him.) What a proposition, ts, ts. Terrific, terrific.
‘Cause she’s suffered, Ben, the woman has suffered. You un-
derstand me? A man can’t go out the way, he came in, Ben, a
man has got to add up to something. You can’t, you can’t —
(Ben moves toward him as though to interrupt.) You gotta con-
sider, now. Don’t answer so quick. Remember, it’s a guaran-
teed twenty-thousand-dollar proposition. Now look, Ben, I
want you to go through the ins and outs of this thing with me.
I’ve got nobody to talk to, Ben, and the woman has suffered,
you hear me?

BEN (standing still, considering): What’s the proposition?
WILLY: It’s twenty thousand dollars on the barrelhead. Guaran-

teed, gilt-edged, you understand?
BEN: You don’t want to make a fool of yourself. They might not

honor the policy.
WILLY: How can they dare refuse? Didn’t I work like a coolie to

meet every premium on the nose? And now they don’t pay off?
Impossible!

BEN: It’s called a cowardly thing, William.
WILLY: Why? Does it take more guts to stand here the rest of my

life ringing up a zero?
BEN (yielding): That’s a point, William. (He moves, thinking,

turns.) And twenty thousand — that is something one can feel
with the hand, it is there.

WILLY (now assured, with rising power): Oh, Ben, that’s the

whole beauty of it! I see it like a diamond, shining in the dark,
hard and rough, that I can pick up and touch in my hand. Not
like — like an appointment! This would not be another
damned-fool appointment, Ben, and it changes all the aspects.
Because he thinks I’m nothing, see, and so he spites me. But
the funeral… (Straightening up.) Ben, that funeral will be mas-
sive! They’ll come from Maine, Massachusetts, Vermont, New
Hampshire! All the oldtimers with the strange license plates —
that boy will be thunderstruck, Ben, because he never realized
— I am known! Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey — I am
known, Ben, and he’ll see it with his eyes once and for all. He’ll
see what I am, Ben! He’s in for a shock, that boy!

BEN (coming down to the edge of the garden): He’ll call you a cow-
ard.

WILLY (suddenly fearful): No, that would be terrible.
BEN: Yes. And a damned fool.
WILLY: No, no, he mustn’t, I won’t have that! (He is broken and

desperate.)
BEN: He’ll hate you, William.

(The gay music of the Boys is heard.)

WILLY: Oh, Ben, how do we get back to all the great times? Used
to be so full of light, and comradeship, the sleigh-riding in win-
ter, and the ruddiness on his cheeks. And always some kind of
good news coming up, always something nice coming up ahead.
And never even let me carry the valises in the house, and si-
monizing, simonizing that little red car! Why, why can’t I give
him something and not have him hate me?

BEN: Let me think about it. (He glances at his watch.) I still have
a little time. Remarkable proposition, but you’ve got to be sure
you’re not making a fool of yourself. (Ben drifts off upstage and
goes out of sight. Biff comes down from the left.)

WILLY (suddenly conscious of Biff, turns and looks up at him,
then begins picking up the packages of seeds in confusion.):
Where the hell is that seed? (Indignantly.) You can’t see noth-
ing out here! They boxed in the whole goddam neighborhood!

BIFF: There are people all around here. Don’t you realize that?
WILLY: I’m busy. Don’t bother me.

BIFF (taking the hoe from Willy): I’m saying good-by to you, Pop.
(Willy looks at him, silent, unable to move.) I’m not coming
back any more.

WILLY: You’re not going to see Oliver tomorrow?
BIFF: I’ve got no appointment, Dad.
WILLY: He put his arm around you, and you’ve got no appoint-

ment?
BIFF: Pop, get this now, will you? Everytime I’ve left it’s been a

fight that sent me out of here. Today I realized something
about myself and I tried to explain it to you and I — I think
I’m just not smart enough to make any sense out of it for you.
To hell with whose fault it is or anything like that. (He takes
Willy’s arm.) Let’s just wrap it up, heh? Come on in, we’ll tell
Mom. (He gently tries to pull Willy to left.)

WILLY (frozen, immobile, with guilt in his voice): No, I don’t want
to see her.

BIFF: Come on! (He pulls again, and Willy tries to pull away.)
WILLY (highly nervous): No, no, I don’t want to see her.
BIFF (tries to look into Willy’s face, as if to find the answer there):

Why don’t you want to see her?
WILLY (more harshly now): Don’t bother me, will you?
BIFF: What do you mean, you don’t want to see her? You don’t

want them calling you yellow, do you? This isn’t your fault; it’s
me, I’m a bum. Now come inside! (Willy strains to get away.)
Did you hear what I said to you?

(Willy pulls away and quickly goes by himself into the house.
Biff follows.)

LINDA (to Willy): Did you plant, dear?
BIFF (at the door, to Linda). All right, we had it out. I’m going

and I’m not writing any more.
LINDA (going to Willy in the kitchen): I think that’s the best way,

dear. ‘Cause there’s no use drawing it out, you’ll just never get
along.

(Willy doesn’t respond.)

BIFF: People ask where I am and what I’m doing, you don’t

know, and you don’t care. That way it’ll be off your mind and
you can start brightening up again. All right? That clears it,
doesn’t it? (Willy is silent, and Biff goes to him.) You gonna
wish me luck, scout? (He extends his hand.) What do you say?

LINDA: Shake his hand, Willy.
WILLY (turning to her, seething with hurt): There’s no necessity

to mention the pen at all, y’know.
BIFF (gently): I’ve got no appointment, Dad.
WILLY (erupting fiercely). He put his arm around… ?
BIFF: Dad, you’re never going to see what I am, so what’s the use

of arguing? If I strike oil I’ll send you a check. Meantime forget
I’m alive.

WILLY (to Linda): Spite, see?
BIFF: Shake hands, Dad.
WILLY: Not my hand.
BIFF: I was hoping not to go this way.
WILLY: Well, this is the way you’re going. Good-by.

(Biff looks at him a moment, then turns sharply and goes to the
stairs.)

WILLY (stops him with): May you rot in hell if you leave this
house!

BIFF (turning): Exactly what is it that you want from me?
WILLY: I want you to know, on the train, in the mountains, in

the valleys, wherever you go, that you cut down your life for
spite!

BIFF: No, no.
WILLY: Spite, spite, is the word of your undoing! And when

you’re down and out, remember what did it. When you’re rot-
ting somewhere beside the railroad tracks, remember, and
don’t you dare blame it on me!

BIFF: I’m not blaming it on you!
WILLY: I won’t take the rap for this, you hear?

(Happy comes down the stairs and stands on the bottom step,
watching.)

BIFF: That’s just what I’m telling you!

WILLY (sinking into a chair at a table, with full accusation):
You’re trying to put a knife in me — don’t think I don’t know
what you’re doing!

BIFF: All right, phony! Then let’s lay it on the line. (He whips the
rubber tube out of his pocket and puts it on the table.)

HAPPY: You crazy…
LINDA: Biff! (She moves to grab the hose, but Biff holds it down

with his hand.)
BIFF: Leave it there! Don’t move it!
WILLY (not looking at it): What is that?
BIFF: You know goddam well what that is.
WILLY (caged, wanting to escape): I never saw that.
BIFF: You saw it. The mice didn’t bring it into the cellar! What is

this supposed to do, make a hero out of you? This supposed to
make me sorry for you?

WILLY: Never heard of it.
BIFF: There’ll be no pity for you, you hear it? No pity!
WILLY (to Linda): You hear the spite!
BIFF: No, you’re going to hear the truth — what you are and

what I am!
LINDA: Stop it!
WILLY: Spite!
HAPPY (coming down toward Biff): You cut it now!
BIFF (to Happy): The man don’t know who we are! The man is

gonna know! (To Willy) We never told the truth for ten min-
utes in this house!

HAPPY: We always told the truth!
BIFF (turning on him): You big blow, are you the assistant buyer?

You’re one of the two assistants to the assistant, aren’t you?
HAPPY: Well, I’m practically —
BIFF: You’re practically full of it! We all are! And I’m through

with it. (To Willy.) Now hear this, Willy, this is me.
WILLY: I know you!
BIFF: You know why I had no address for three months? I stole a

suit in Kansas City and I was in jail. (To Linda, who is sob-
bing.) Stop crying. I’m through with it. (Linda turns away from

them, her hands covering her face.)
WILLY: I suppose that’s my fault!
BIFF: I stole myself out of every good job since high school!
WILLY: And whose fault is that?
BIFF: And I never got anywhere because you blew me so full of

hot air I could never stand taking orders from anybody! That’s
whose fault it is!

WILLY: I hear that!
LINDA: Don’t, Biff!
BIFF: It’s goddam time you heard that! I had to be boss big shot

in two weeks, and I’m through with it.
WILLY: Then hang yourself! For spite, hang yourself!
BIFF: No! Nobody’s hanging himself, Willy! I ran down eleven

flights with a pen in my hand today. And suddenly I stopped,
you hear me? And in the middle of that office building, do you
hear this? I stopped in the middle of that building and I saw —
the sky. I saw the things that I love in this world. The work
and the food and time to sit and smoke. And I looked at the pen
and said to myself, what the hell am I grabbing this for? Why
am I trying to become what I don’t want to be? What am I do-
ing in an office, making a contemptuous, begging fool of myself,
when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say I
know who I am! Why can’t I say that, Willy? (He tries to make
Willy face him, but Willy pulls away and moves to the left.)

WILLY (with hatred, threateningly): The door of your life is wide
open!

BIFF: Pop! I’m a dime a dozen, and so are you!
WILLY (turning on him now in an uncontrolled outburst): I am

not a dime a dozen! I am Willy Loman, and you are Biff Loman!

(Biff starts for Willy, but is blocked by Happy. In his fury, Biff
seems on the verge of attacking his father.)

BIFF: I am not a leader of men, Willy, and neither are you. You
were never anything but a hard-working drummer who landed
in the ash can like all the rest of them! I’m one dollar an hour,
Willy I tried seven states and couldn’t raise it. A buck an hour!
Do you gather my meaning? I’m not bringing home any prizes
any more, and you’re going to stop waiting for me to bring

them home!
WILLY (directly to Biff): You vengeful, spiteful mut!

(Biff breaks from Happy. Willy, in fright, starts up the stairs.
Biff grabs him.)

BIFF (at the peak of his fury): Pop, I’m nothing! I’m nothing, Pop.
Can’t you understand that? There’s no spite in it any more.
I’m just what I am, that’s all.

(Biffs fury has spent itself, and he breaks down, sobbing, hold-
ing on to Willy, who dumbly fumbles for Biff’s face.)

WILLY (astonished): What’re you doing? What’re you doing? (To
Linda.) Why is he crying?

BIFF (crying, broken): Will you let me go, for Christ’s sake? Will
you take that phony dream and burn it before something hap-
pens? (Struggling to contain himself, he pulls away and moves
to the stairs.) I’ll go in the morning. Put him — put him to bed.
(Exhausted, Biff moves up the stairs to his room.)

WILLY (after a long pause, astonished, elevated): Isn’t that —
isn’t that remarkable? Biff — he likes me!

LINDA: He loves you, Willy!
HAPPY (deeply moved): Always did, Pop.
WILLY: Oh, Biff! (Staring wildly.) He cried! Cried to me. (He is

choking with his love, and now cries out his promise.) That boy
— that boy is going to be magnificent! (Ben appears in the light
just outside the kitchen.)

BEN: Yes, outstanding, with twenty thousand behind him.
LINDA (sensing the racing of his mind, fearfully, carefully): Now

come to bed, Willy. It’s all settled now.
WILLY (finding it difficult not to rush out of the house): Yes, we’ll

sleep. Come on. Go to sleep, Hap.
BEN: And it does take a great kind of a man to crack the jungle.

(In accents of dread, Ben’s idyllic music starts up.)
HAPPY (his arm around Linda): I’m getting married, Pop, don’t

forget it. I’m changing everything. I’m gonna run that depart-
ment before the year is up. You’ll see, Mom. (He kisses her.)

BEN: The jungle is dark but full of diamonds, Willy.

(Willy turns, moves, listening to Ben.)

LINDA: Be good. You’re both good boys, just act that way, that’s
all.

HAPPY: ‘Night, Pop. (He goes upstairs.)
LINDA (to Willy): Come, dear.
BEN (with greater force): One must go in to fetch a diamond out.
WILLY (to Linda, as he moves slowly along the edge of kitchen,

toward the door): I just want to get settled down, Linda. Let me
sit alone for a little.

LINDA (almost uttering her fear): I want you upstairs.
WILLY (taking her in his arms): In a few minutes, Linda. I

couldn’t sleep right now. Go on, you look awful tired. (He kisses
her.)

BEN: Not like an appointment at all. A diamond is rough and
hard to the touch.

WILLY: Go on now. I’ll be right up.
LINDA: I think this is the only way, Willy.
WILLY: Sure, it’s the best thing.
BEN: Best thing!
WILLY: The only way. Everything is gonna be — go on, kid, get to

bed. You look so tired.
LINDA: Come right up.
WILLY: Two minutes.

(Linda goes into the living room, then reappears in her bed-
room. Willy moves just outside the kitchen door.)

WILLY: Loves me. (Wonderingly.) Always loved me. Isn’t that a
remarkable thing? Ben, he’ll worship me for it!

BEN (with promise): It’s dark there, but full of diamonds.
WILLY: Can you imagine that magnificence with twenty thou-

sand dollars in his pocket?
LINDA (calling from her room): Willy! Come up!
WILLY (calling into the kitchen): Yes! Yes. Coming! It’s very

smart, you realize that, don’t you, sweetheart? Even Ben sees
it. I gotta go, baby. ‘By! ‘By! (Going over to Ben, almost danc-
ing.) Imagine? When the mail comes he’ll be ahead of Bernard

again!
BEN: A perfect proposition all around.
WILLY: Did you see how he cried to me? Oh, if I could kiss him,

Ben!
BEN: Time, William, time!
WILLY: Oh, Ben, I always knew one way or another we were

gonna make it, Biff and I!
BEN (looking at his watch): The boat. We’ll be late. (He moves

slowly off into the darkness.)
WILLY (elegiacally, turning to the house): Now when you kick off,

boy, I want a seventy-yard boot, and get right down the field
under the ball, and when you hit, hit low and hit hard, because
it’s important, boy. (He swings around and faces the audience.)
There’s all kinds of important people in the stands, and the
first thing you know… (Suddenly realizing he is alone.) Ben!
Ben, where do I… ? (He makes a sudden movement of search.)
Ben, how do I… ?

LINDA (calling): Willy, you coming up?
WILLY (uttering a gasp of fear, whirling about as if to quiet her):

Sh! (He turns around as if to find his way; sounds, faces, voices,
seem to be swarming in upon him and he flicks at them, cry-
ing.) Sh! Sh! (Suddenly music, faint and high, stops him. It
rises in intensity, almost to an unbearable scream. He goes up
and down on his toes, and rushes off around the house.) Shhh!

LINDA: Willy?

(There is no answer. Linda waits. Biff gets up off his bed. He is
still in his clothes. Happy sits up. Biff stands listening.)

LINDA (with real fear): Willy, answer me! Willy!

(There is the sound of a car starting and moving away at full
speed.)

LINDA: No!
BIFF (rushing down the stairs): Pop!

(As the car speeds off, the music crashes down in a frenzy of
sound, which becomes the soft pulsation of a single cello string.
Biff slowly returns to his bedroom. He and Happy gravely don

their jackets. Linda slowly walks out of her room. The music has
developed into a dead march. The leaves of day are appearing over
everything. Charley and Bernard, somberly dressed, appear and
knock on the kitchen door. Biff and Happy slowly descend the
stairs to the kitchen as Charley and Bernard enter. All stop a mo-
ment when Linda, in clothes of mourning, bearing a little bunch of
roses, comes through the draped doorway into the kitchen. She goes
to Charley and takes his arm. Now all move toward the audience,
through the wall-line of the kitchen. At the limit of the apron,
Linda lays down the flowers, kneels, and sits back on her heels. All
stare down at the grave.)

REQUIEM

CHARLEY: It’s getting dark, Linda.

(Linda doesn’t react. She stares at the grave.)

BIFF: How about it, Mom? Better get some rest, heh? They’ll be
closing the gate soon.

(Linda makes no move. Pause.)

HAPPY (deeply angered): He had no right to do that. There was
no necessity for it. We would’ve helped him.

CHARLEY (grunting): Hmmm.
BIFF: Come along, Mom.
LINDA: Why didn’t anybody come?
CHARLEY: It was a very nice funeral.
LINDA: But where are all the people he knew? Maybe they blame

him.
CHARLEY: Naa. It’s a rough world, Linda. They wouldn’t blame

him.
LINDA: I can’t understand it. At this time especially. First time in

thirty-five years we were just about free and clear. He only
needed a little salary. He was even finished with the dentist.

CHARLEY: No man only needs a little salary.
LINDA: I can’t understand it.
BIFF: There were a lot of nice days. When he’d come home from a

trip; or on Sundays, making the stoop; finishing the cellar; put-
ting on the new porch; when he built the extra bathroom; and
put up the garage. You know something, Charley, there’s more
of him in that front stoop than in all the sales he ever made.

CHARLEY: Yeah. He was a happy man with a batch of cement.
LINDA: He was so wonderful with his hands.
BIFF: He had the wrong dreams. All, all, wrong.
HAPPY (almost ready to fight Biff): Don’t say that!
BIFF: He never knew who he was.
CHARLEY (stopping Happy’s movement and reply. To Biff): No-

body dast blame this man. You don’t understand: Willy was a

salesman. And for a salesman, there is no rock bottom to the
life. He don’t put a bolt to a nut, he don’t tell you the law or
give you medicine. He’s man way out there in the blue, riding
on a smile and a Shoeshine. And when they start not smiling
back — that’s an earthquake. And then you get yourself a cou-
ple of spots on your hat, and you’re finished. Nobody dast
blame this man. A salesman is got to dream, boy. It comes with
the territory.

BIFF: Charley, the man didn’t know who he was.
HAPPY (infuriated): Don’t say that!
BIFF: Why don’t you come with me, Happy?
HAPPY: I’m not licked that easily. I’m staying right in this city,

and I’m gonna beat this racket! (He looks at Biff, his chin set.)
The Loman Brothers!

BIFF: I know who I am, kid.
HAPPY: All right, boy. I’m gonna show you and everybody else

that Willy Loman did not die in vain. He had a good dream. It’s
the only dream you can have — to come out number-one man.
He fought it out here, and this is where I’m gonna win it for
him.

BIFF (with a hopeless glance at Happy, bends toward his mother):
Let’s go, Mom.

LINDA: I’ll be with you in a minute. Go on, Charley. (He hesi-
tates.) I want to, just for a minute. I never had a chance to say
good-by.

(Charley moves away, followed by Happy. Biff remains a slight
distance up and left of Linda. She sits there, summoning herself.
The flute begins, not far away, playing behind her speech.)

LINDA: Forgive me, dear. I can’t cry. I don’t know what it is, I
can’t cry. I don’t understand it. Why did you ever do that? Help
me Willy, I can’t cry. It seems to me that you’re just on another
trip. I keep expecting you. Willy, dear, I can’t cry. Why did you
do it? I search and search and I search, and I can’t understand
it, Willy. I made the last payment on the house today. Today,
dear. And there’ll be nobody home. (A sob rises in her throat.)
We’re free and clear. (Sobbing more fully, released.) We’re free.
(Biff comes slowly toward her.) We’re free… We’re free… (Biff

lifts her to her feet and moves out up right with her in his arms.
Linda sobs quietly. Bernard and Charley come together and fol-
low them, followed by Happy. Only the music of the flute is left
on the darkening stage as over the house the hard towers of the
apartment buildings rise into sharp focus, and the curtain
falls.)

“A Rose for Emily”
by William Faulkner (1930)

I

WHEN Miss Emily Grierson died, our whole town went to her funeral: the
men through a sort of respectful affection for a fallen monument, the
women mostly out of curiosity to see the inside of her house, which no
one save an old man-servant–a combined gardener and cook–had seen
in at least ten years.

It was a big, squarish frame house that had once been white, decorated
with cupolas and spires and scrolled balconies in the heavily lightsome
style of the seventies, set on what had once been our most select street.
But garages and cotton gins had encroached and obliterated even the
august names of that neighborhood; only Miss Emily’s house was left,
lifting its stubborn and coquettish decay above the cotton wagons and
the gasoline pumps-an eyesore among eyesores. And now Miss Emily had
gone to join the representatives of those august names where they lay in
the cedar-bemused cemetery among the ranked and anonymous graves
of Union and Confederate soldiers who fell at the battle of Jefferson.

Alive, Miss Emily had been a tradition, a duty, and a care; a sort of
hereditary obligation upon the town, dating from that day in 1894 when
Colonel Sartoris, the mayor–he who fathered the edict that no Negro
woman should appear on the streets without an apron-remitted her
taxes, the dispensation dating from the death of her father on into
perpetuity. Not that Miss Emily would have accepted charity. Colonel
Sartoris invented an involved tale to the effect that Miss Emily’s father had
loaned money to the town, which the town, as a matter of business,
preferred this way of repaying. Only a man of Colonel Sartoris’ generation
and thought could have invented it, and only a woman could have
believed it.

When the next generation, with its more modern ideas, became mayors
and aldermen, this arrangement created some little dissatisfaction. On
the first of the year they mailed her a tax notice. February came, and
there was no reply. They wrote her a formal letter, asking her to call at
the sheriff’s office at her convenience. A week later the mayor wrote her
himself, offering to call or to send his car for her, and received in reply a
note on paper of an archaic shape, in a thin, flowing calligraphy in faded
ink, to the effect that she no longer went out at all. The tax notice was
also enclosed, without comment.

They called a special meeting of the Board of Aldermen. A deputation
waited upon her, knocked at the door through which no visitor had
passed since she ceased giving china-painting lessons eight or ten years
earlier. They were admitted by the old Negro into a dim hall from which a
stairway mounted into still more shadow. It smelled of dust and disuse–
a close, dank smell. The Negro led them into the parlor. It was furnished
in heavy, leather-covered furniture. When the Negro opened the blinds of
one window, they could see that the leather was cracked; and when they
sat down, a faint dust rose sluggishly about their thighs, spinning with
slow motes in the single sun-ray. On a tarnished gilt easel before the
fireplace stood a crayon portrait of Miss Emily’s father.

They rose when she entered–a small, fat woman in black, with a thin
gold chain descending to her waist and vanishing into her belt, leaning
on an ebony cane with a tarnished gold head. Her skeleton was small and
spare; perhaps that was why what would have been merely plumpness in
another was obesity in her. She looked bloated, like a body long
submerged in motionless water, and of that pallid hue. Her eyes, lost in
the fatty ridges of her face, looked like two small pieces of coal pressed
into a lump of dough as they moved from one face to another while the
visitors stated their errand.

She did not ask them to sit. She just stood in the door and listened
quietly until the spokesman came to a stumbling halt. Then they could
hear the invisible watch ticking at the end of the gold chain.

Her voice was dry and cold. “I have no taxes in Jefferson. Colonel Sartoris
explained it to me. Perhaps one of you can gain access to the city records
and satisfy yourselves.”

“But we have. We are the city authorities, Miss Emily. Didn’t you get a
notice from the sheriff, signed by him?”

“I received a paper, yes,” Miss Emily said. “Perhaps he considers himself
the sheriff . . . I have no taxes in Jefferson.”

“But there is nothing on the books to show that, you see We must go by
the–”

“See Colonel Sartoris. I have no taxes in Jefferson.”

“But, Miss Emily–”

“See Colonel Sartoris.” (Colonel Sartoris had been dead almost ten years.)
“I have no taxes in Jefferson. Tobe!” The Negro appeared. “Show these
gentlemen out.”

II

So SHE vanquished them, horse and foot, just as she had vanquished
their fathers thirty years before about the smell.

That was two years after her father’s death and a short time after her
sweetheart–the one we believed would marry her –had deserted her.
After her father’s death she went out very little; after her sweetheart went
away, people hardly saw her at all. A few of the ladies had the temerity to
call, but were not received, and the only sign of life about the place was
the Negro man–a young man then–going in and out with a market
basket.

“Just as if a man–any man–could keep a kitchen properly, “the ladies
said; so they were not surprised when the smell developed. It was another
link between the gross, teeming world and the high and mighty
Griersons.

A neighbor, a woman, complained to the mayor, Judge Stevens, eighty
years old.

“But what will you have me do about it, madam?” he said.

“Why, send her word to stop it,” the woman said. “Isn’t there a law? ”

“I’m sure that won’t be necessary,” Judge Stevens said. “It’s probably just a
snake or a rat that nigger of hers killed in the yard. I’ll speak to him about
it.”

The next day he received two more complaints, one from a man who
came in diffident deprecation. “We really must do something about it,
Judge. I’d be the last one in the world to bother Miss Emily, but we’ve got
to do something.” That night the Board of Aldermen met–three
graybeards and one younger man, a member of the rising generation.

“It’s simple enough,” he said. “Send her word to have her place cleaned
up. Give her a certain time to do it in, and if she don’t. ..”

“Dammit, sir,” Judge Stevens said, “will you accuse a lady to her face of
smelling bad?”

So the next night, after midnight, four men crossed Miss Emily’s lawn and
slunk about the house like burglars, sniffing along the base of the
brickwork and at the cellar openings while one of them performed a
regular sowing motion with his hand out of a sack slung from his
shoulder. They broke open the cellar door and sprinkled lime there, and
in all the outbuildings. As they recrossed the lawn, a window that had
been dark was lighted and Miss Emily sat in it, the light behind her, and
her upright torso motionless as that of an idol. They crept quietly across
the lawn and into the shadow of the locusts that lined the street. After a
week or two the smell went away.

That was when people had begun to feel really sorry for her. People in
our town, remembering how old lady Wyatt, her great-aunt, had gone
completely crazy at last, believed that the Griersons held themselves a
little too high for what they really were. None of the young men were
quite good enough for Miss Emily and such. We had long thought of them
as a tableau, Miss Emily a slender figure in white in the background, her
father a spraddled silhouette in the foreground, his back to her and
clutching a horsewhip, the two of them framed by the back-flung front
door. So when she got to be thirty and was still single, we were not
pleased exactly, but vindicated; even with insanity in the family she
wouldn’t have turned down all of her chances if they had really
materialized.

When her father died, it got about that the house was all that was left to
her; and in a way, people were glad. At last they could pity Miss Emily.
Being left alone, and a pauper, she had become humanized. Now she too
would know the old thrill and the old despair of a penny more or less.

The day after his death all the ladies prepared to call at the house and
offer condolence and aid, as is our custom Miss Emily met them at the
door, dressed as usual and with no trace of grief on her face. She told
them that her father was not dead. She did that for three days, with the
ministers calling on her, and the doctors, trying to persuade her to let
them dispose of the body. Just as they were about to resort to law and
force, she broke down, and they buried her father quickly.

We did not say she was crazy then. We believed she had to do that. We
remembered all the young men her father had driven away, and we knew
that with nothing left, she would have to cling to that which had robbed
her, as people will.

III

SHE WAS SICK for a long time. When we saw her again, her hair was cut
short, making her look like a girl, with a vague resemblance to those
angels in colored church windows–sort of tragic and serene.

The town had just let the contracts for paving the sidewalks, and in the
summer after her father’s death they began the work. The construction
company came with riggers and mules and machinery, and a foreman
named Homer Barron, a Yankee–a big, dark, ready man, with a big voice
and eyes lighter than his face. The little boys would follow in groups to
hear him cuss the riggers, and the riggers singing in time to the rise and
fall of picks. Pretty soon he knew everybody in town. Whenever you heard
a lot of laughing anywhere about the square, Homer Barron would be in
the center of the group. Presently we began to see him and Miss Emily on
Sunday afternoons driving in the yellow-wheeled buggy and the matched
team of bays from the livery stable.

At first we were glad that Miss Emily would have an interest, because the
ladies all said, “Of course a Grierson would not think seriously of a
Northerner, a day laborer.” But there were still others, older people, who
said that even grief could not cause a real lady to forget noblesse oblige-
–
without calling it noblesse oblige. They just said, “Poor Emily. Her
kinsfolk should come to her.” She had some kin in Alabama; but years
ago her father had fallen out with them over the estate of old lady Wyatt,
the crazy woman, and there was no communication between the two
families. They had not even been represented at the funeral.

And as soon as the old people said, “Poor Emily,” the whispering began.
“Do you suppose it’s really so?” they said to one another. “Of course it is.
What else could . . .” This behind their hands; rustling of craned silk and
satin behind jalousies closed upon the sun of Sunday afternoon as the
thin, swift clop-clop-clop of the matched team passed: “Poor Emily.”

She carried her head high enough–even when we believed that she was
fallen. It was as if she demanded more than ever the recognition of her
dignity as the last Grierson; as if it had wanted that touch of earthiness to
reaffirm her imperviousness. Like when she bought the rat poison, the
arsenic. That was over a year after they had begun to say “Poor Emily,”
and while the two female cousins were visiting her.

“I want some poison,” she said to the druggist. She was over thirty then,
still a slight woman, though thinner than usual, with cold, haughty black

eyes in a face the flesh of which was strained across the temples and
about the eyesockets as you imagine a lighthouse-keeper’s face ought to
look. “I want some poison,” she said.

“Yes, Miss Emily. What kind? For rats and such? I’d recom–”

“I want the best you have. I don’t care what kind.”

The druggist named several. “They’ll kill anything up to an elephant. But
what you want is–”

“Arsenic,” Miss Emily said. “Is that a good one?”

“Is . . . arsenic? Yes, ma’am. But what you want–”

“I want arsenic.”

The druggist looked down at her. She looked back at him, erect, her face
like a strained flag. “Why, of course,” the druggist said. “If that’s what you
want. But the law requires you to tell what you are going to use it for.”

Miss Emily just stared at him, her head tilted back in order to look him
eye for eye, until he looked away and went and got the arsenic and
wrapped it up. The Negro delivery boy brought her the package; the
druggist didn’t come back. When she opened the package at home there
was written on the box, under the skull and bones: “For rats.”

IV

So THE NEXT day we all said, “She will kill herself”; and we said it would
be the best thing. When she had first begun to be seen with Homer
Barron, we had said, “She will marry him.” Then we said, “She will
persuade him yet,” because Homer himself had remarked–he liked men,
and it was known that he drank with the younger men in the Elks’ Club–
that he was not a marrying man. Later we said, “Poor Emily” behind the
jalousies as they passed on Sunday afternoon in the glittering buggy,
Miss Emily with her head high and Homer Barron with his hat cocked and
a cigar in his teeth, reins and whip in a yellow glove.

Then some of the ladies began to say that it was a disgrace to the town
and a bad example to the young people. The men did not want to
interfere, but at last the ladies forced the Baptist minister–Miss Emily’s
people were Episcopal– to call upon her. He would never divulge what
happened during that interview, but he refused to go back again. The

next Sunday they again drove about the streets, and the following day the
minister’s wife wrote to Miss Emily’s relations in Alabama.

So she had blood-kin under her roof again and we sat back to watch
developments. At first nothing happened. Then we were sure that they
were to be married. We learned that Miss Emily had been to the jeweler’s
and ordered a man’s toilet set in silver, with the letters H. B. on each
piece. Two days later we learned that she had bought a complete outfit of
men’s clothing, including a nightshirt, and we said, “They are married.”
We were really glad. We were glad because the two female cousins were
even more Grierson than Miss Emily had ever been.

So we were not surprised when Homer Barron–the streets had been
finished some time since–was gone. We were a little disappointed that
there was not a public blowing-off, but we believed that he had gone on
to prepare for Miss Emily’s coming, or to give her a chance to get rid of
the cousins. (By that time it was a cabal, and we were all Miss Emily’s
allies to help circumvent the cousins.) Sure enough, after another week
they departed. And, as we had expected all along, within three days
Homer Barron was back in town. A neighbor saw the Negro man admit
him at the kitchen door at dusk one evening.

And that was the last we saw of Homer Barron. And of Miss Emily for
some time. The Negro man went in and out with the market basket, but
the front door remained closed. Now and then we would see her at a
window for a moment, as the men did that night when they sprinkled the
lime, but for almost six months she did not appear on the streets. Then
we knew that this was to be expected too; as if that quality of her father
which had thwarted her woman’s life so many times had been too virulent
and too furious to die.

When we next saw Miss Emily, she had grown fat and her hair was turning
gray. During the next few years it grew grayer and grayer until it attained
an even pepper-and-salt iron-gray, when it ceased turning. Up to the day
of her death at seventy-four it was still that vigorous iron-gray, like the
hair of an active man.

From that time on her front door remained closed, save for a period of
six or seven years, when she was about forty, during which she gave
lessons in china-painting. She fitted up a studio in one of the downstairs
rooms, where the daughters and granddaughters of Colonel Sartoris’
contemporaries were sent to her with the same regularity and in the same
spirit that they were sent to church on Sundays with a twenty-five-cent
piece for the collection plate. Meanwhile her taxes had been remitted.

Then the newer generation became the backbone and the spirit of the
town, and the painting pupils grew up and fell away and did not send
their children to her with boxes of color and tedious brushes and pictures
cut from the ladies’ magazines. The front door closed upon the last one
and remained closed for good. When the town got free postal delivery,
Miss Emily alone refused to let them fasten the metal numbers above her
door and attach a mailbox to it. She would not listen to them.

Daily, monthly, yearly we watched the Negro grow grayer and more
stooped, going in and out with the market basket. Each December we
sent her a tax notice, which would be returned by the post office a week
later, unclaimed. Now and then we would see her in one of the
downstairs windows–she had evidently shut up the top floor of the
house–like the carven torso of an idol in a niche, looking or not looking
at us, we could never tell which. Thus she passed from generation to
generation–dear, inescapable, impervious, tranquil, and perverse.

And so she died. Fell ill in the house filled with dust and shadows, with
only a doddering Negro man to wait on her. We did not even know she
was sick; we had long since given up trying to get any information from
the Negro

He talked to no one, probably not even to her, for his voice had grown
harsh and rusty, as if from disuse.

She died in one of the downstairs rooms, in a heavy walnut bed with a
curtain, her gray head propped on a pillow yellow and moldy with age
and lack of sunlight.

V

THE NEGRO met the first of the ladies at the front door and let them in,
with their hushed, sibilant voices and their quick, curious glances, and
then he disappeared. He walked right through the house and out the back
and was not seen again.

The two female cousins came at once. They held the funeral on the
second day, with the town coming to look at Miss Emily beneath a mass
of bought flowers, with the crayon face of her father musing profoundly
above the bier and the ladies sibilant and macabre; and the very old men
–some in their brushed Confederate uniforms–on the porch and the
lawn, talking of Miss Emily as if she had been a contemporary of theirs,
believing that they had danced with her and courted her perhaps,
confusing time with its mathematical progression, as the old do, to whom
all the past is not a diminishing road but, instead, a huge meadow which

no winter ever quite touches, divided from them now by the narrow
bottle-neck of the most recent decade of years.

Already we knew that there was one room in that region above stairs
which no one had seen in forty years, and which would have to be forced.
They waited until Miss Emily was decently in the ground before they
opened it.

The violence of breaking down the door seemed to fill this room with
pervading dust. A thin, acrid pall as of the tomb seemed to lie everywhere
upon this room decked and furnished as for a bridal: upon the valance
curtains of faded rose color, upon the rose-shaded lights, upon the
dressing table, upon the delicate array of crystal and the man’s toilet
things backed with tarnished silver, silver so tarnished that the
monogram was obscured. Among them lay a collar and tie, as if they had
just been removed, which, lifted, left upon the surface a pale crescent in
the dust. Upon a chair hung the suit, carefully folded; beneath it the two
mute shoes and the discarded socks.

The man himself lay in the bed.

For a long while we just stood there, looking down at the profound and
fleshless grin. The body had apparently once lain in the attitude of an
embrace, but now the long sleep that outlasts love, that conquers even
the grimace of love, had cuckolded him. What was left of him, rotted
beneath what was left of the nightshirt, had become inextricable from the
bed in which he lay; and upon him and upon the pillow beside him lay
that even coating of the patient and biding dust.

Then we noticed that in the second pillow was the indentation of a head.
One of us lifted something from it, and leaning forward, that faint and
invisible dust dry and acrid in the nostrils, we saw a long strand of iron-
gray hair.

“Hills Like White Elephants”
By Ernest Hemingway (1927)

The hills across the valley of the Ebro were long and white. On this siode
there was no shade and no trees and the station was between two lines of
rails in the sun. Close against the side of the station there was the warm
shadow of the building and a curtain, made of strings of bamboo beads,
hung across the open door into the bar, to keep out flies. The American
and the girl with him sat at a table in the shade, outside the building. It
was very hot and the express from Barcelona would come in forty
minutes. It stopped at this junction for two minutes and went to Madrid.
‘What should we drink?’ the girl asked. She had taken off her hat and put
it on the table.

‘It’s pretty hot,’ the man said.

‘Let’s drink beer.’

‘Dos cervezas,’ the man said into the curtain.

‘Big ones?’ a woman asked from the doorway.

‘Yes. Two big ones.’

The woman brought two glasses of beer and two felt pads. She put the
felt pads and the beer glass on the table and looked at the man and the
girl. The girl was looking off at the line of hills. They were white in the
sun and the country was brown and dry.

‘They look like white elephants,’ she said.

‘I’ve never seen one,’ the man drank his beer.

‘No, you wouldn’t have.’

‘I might have,’ the man said. ‘Just because you say I wouldn’t have doesn’t
prove anything.’

The girl looked at the bead curtain. ‘They’ve painted something on it,’ she
said. ‘What does it say?’

‘Anis del Toro. It’s a drink.’

‘Could we try it?’

The man called ‘Listen’ through the curtain. The woman came out from
the bar.

‘Four reales.’ ‘We want two Anis del Toro.’

‘With water?’

‘Do you want it with water?’

‘I don’t know,’ the girl said. ‘Is it good with water?’

‘It’s all right.’

‘You want them with water?’ asked the woman.

‘Yes, with water.’

‘It tastes like liquorice,’ the girl said and put the glass down.

‘That’s the way with everything.’

‘Yes,’ said the girl. ‘Everything tastes of liquorice. Especially all the things
you’ve waited so long for, like absinthe.’

‘Oh, cut it out.’

‘You started it,’ the girl said. ‘I was being amused. I was having a fine
time.’

‘Well, let’s try and have a fine time.’

‘Alright. I was trying. I said the mountains looked like white elephants.
Wasn’t that bright?’

‘That was bright.’

‘I wanted to try this new drink. That’s all we do, isn’t it – look at things
and try new drinks?’

‘I guess so.’

The girl looked across at the hills.

‘They’re lovely hills,’ she said. ‘They don’t really look like white elephants.
I just meant the colouring of their skin through the trees.’

‘Should we have another drink?’

‘All right.’

The warm wind blew the bead curtain against the table.

‘The beer’s nice and cool,’ the man said.

‘It’s lovely,’ the girl said.

‘It’s really an awfully simple operation, Jig,’ the man said. ‘It’s not really an
operation at all.’

The girl looked at the ground the table legs rested on.

‘I know you wouldn’t mind it, Jig. It’s really not anything. It’s just to let the
air in.’

The girl did not say anything.

‘I’ll go with you and I’ll stay with you all the time. They just let the air in
and then it’s all perfectly natural.’

‘Then what will we do afterwards?’

‘We’ll be fine afterwards. Just like we were before.’

‘What makes you think so?’

‘That’s the only thing that bothers us. It’s the only thing that’s made us
unhappy.’

The girl looked at the bead curtain, put her hand out and took hold of
two of the strings of beads.

‘And you think then we’ll be all right and be happy.’

‘I know we will. Yon don’t have to be afraid. I’ve known lots of people that
have done it.’

‘So have I,’ said the girl. ‘And afterwards they were all so happy.’

‘Well,’ the man said, ‘if you don’t want to you don’t have to. I wouldn’t
have you do it if you didn’t want to. But I know it’s perfectly simple.’

‘And you really want to?’

‘I think it’s the best thing to do. But I don’t want you to do it if you don’t
really want to.’

‘And if I do it you’ll be happy and things will be like they were and you’ll
love me?’

‘I love you now. You know I love you.’

‘I know. But if I do it, then it will be nice again if I say things are like white
elephants, and you’ll like it?’

‘I’ll love it. I love it now but I just can’t think about it. You know how I get
when I worry.’

‘If I do it you won’t ever worry?’

‘I won’t worry about that because it’s perfectly simple.’

‘Then I’ll do it. Because I don’t care about me.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘I don’t care about me.’

‘Well, I care about you.’

‘Oh, yes. But I don’t care about me. And I’ll do it and then everything will
be fine.’

‘I don’t want you to do it if you feel that way.’

The girl stood up and walked to the end of the station. Across, on the
other side, were fields of grain and trees along the banks of the Ebro. Far
away, beyond the river, were mountains. The shadow of a cloud moved
across the field of grain and she saw the river through the trees.

‘And we could have all this,’ she said. ‘And we could have everything and
every day we make it more impossible.’

‘What did you say?’

‘I said we could have everything.’

‘No, we can’t.’

‘We can have the whole world.’

‘No, we can’t.’

‘We can go everywhere.’

‘No, we can’t. It isn’t ours any more.’

‘It’s ours.’

‘No, it isn’t. And once they take it away, you never get it back.’

‘But they haven’t taken it away.’

‘We’ll wait and see.’

‘Come on back in the shade,’ he said. ‘You mustn’t feel that way.’

‘I don’t feel any way,’ the girl said. ‘I just know things.’

‘I don’t want you to do anything that you don’t want to do -‘

‘Nor that isn’t good for me,’ she said. ‘I know. Could we have another
beer?’

‘All right. But you’ve got to realize – ‘

‘I realize,’ the girl said. ‘Can’t we maybe stop talking?’

They sat down at the table and the girl looked across at the hills on the
dry side of the valley and the man looked at her and at the table.

‘You’ve got to realize,’ he said, ‘ that I don’t want you to do it if you don’t
want to. I’m perfectly willing to go through with it if it means anything to
you.’

‘Doesn’t it mean anything to you? We could get along.’

‘Of course it does. But I don’t want anybody but you. I don’t want anyone
else. And I know it’s perfectly simple.’

‘Yes, you know it’s perfectly simple.’

‘It’s all right for you to say that, but I do know it.’

‘Would you do something for me now?’

‘I’d do anything for you.’

‘Would you please please please please please please please stop talking?’

He did not say anything but looked at the bags against the wall of the
station. There were labels on them from all the hotels where they had
spent nights.

‘But I don’t want you to,’ he said, ‘I don’t care anything about it.’

‘I’ll scream,’ the girl siad.

The woman came out through the curtains with two glasses of beer and
put them down on the damp felt pads. ‘The train comes in five minutes,’
she said.

‘What did she say?’ asked the girl.

‘That the train is coming in five minutes.’

The girl smiled brightly at the woman, to thank her.

‘I’d better take the bags over to the other side of the station,’ the man
said. She smiled at him.

‘All right. Then come back and we’ll finish the beer.’

He picked up the two heavy bags and carried them around the station to
the other tracks. He looked up the tracks but could not see the train.
Coming back, he walked through the bar-room, where people waiting for
the train were drinking. He drank an Anis at the bar and looked at the
people. They were all waiting reasonably for the train. He went out
through the bead curtain. She was sitting at the table and smiled at him.

‘Do you feel better?’ he asked.

‘I feel fine,’ she said. ‘There’s nothing wrong with me. I feel fine.’
List of Short Stories

“Winter Dreams”
by F. Scott Fitzgerald (1922)

I

SOME OF THE CADDIES were poor as sin and lived in one-room houses
with a neurasthenic cow in the front yard, but Dexter Green’s father
owned the second best grocery-store in Black Bear–the best one was
“The Hub,” patronized by the wealthy people from Sherry Island–and
Dexter caddied only for pocket-money.

In the fall when the days became crisp and gray, and the long Minnesota
winter shut down like the white lid of a box, Dexter’s skis moved over the
snow that hid the fairways of the golf course. At these times the country
gave him a feeling of profound melancholy–it offended him that the
links should lie in enforced fallowness, haunted by ragged sparrows for
the long season. It was dreary, too, that on the tees where the gay colors
fluttered in summer there were now only the desolate sand-boxes knee-
deep in crusted ice. When he crossed the hills the wind blew cold as
misery, and if the sun was out he tramped with his eyes squinted up
against the hard dimensionless glare.

In April the winter ceased abruptly. The snow ran down into Black Bear
Lake scarcely tarrying for the early golfers to brave the season with red
and black balls. Without elation, without an interval of moist glory, the
cold was gone.

Dexter knew that there was something dismal about this Northern spring,
just as he knew there was something gorgeous about the fall. Fall made
him clinch his hands and tremble and repeat idiotic sentences to himself,
and make brisk abrupt gestures of command to imaginary audiences and
armies. October filled him with hope which November raised to a sort of
ecstatic triumph, and in this mood the fleeting brilliant impressions of
the summer at Sherry Island were ready grist to his mill. He became a golf
champion and defeated Mr. T. A. Hedrick in a marvellous match played a
hundred times over the fairways of his imagination, a match each detail
of which he changed about untiringly–sometimes he won with almost
laughable ease, sometimes he came up magnificently from behind. Again,
stepping from a Pierce-Arrow automobile, like Mr. Mortimer Jones, he
strolled frigidly into the lounge of the Sherry Island Golf Club– or
perhaps, surrounded by an admiring crowd, he gave an exhibition of
fancy diving from the spring-board of the club raft. . . . Among those
who watched him in open-mouthed wonder was Mr. Mortimer Jones.

And one day it came to pass that Mr. Jones–himself and not his ghost–
came up to Dexter with tears in his eyes and said that Dexter was the—
-best caddy in the club, and wouldn’t he decide not to quit if Mr. Jones
made it worth his while, because every other caddy in the club lost one
ball a hole for him– regularly—-

“No, sir,” said Dexter decisively, “I don’t want to caddy any more.” Then,
after a pause: “I’m too old.”

“You’re not more than fourteen. Why the devil did you decide just this
morning that you wanted to quit? You promised that next week you’d go
over to the State tournament with me.”

“I decided I was too old.”

Dexter handed in his “A Class” badge, collected what money was due him
from the caddy master, and walked home to Black Bear Village.

“The best—-caddy I ever saw,” shouted Mr. Mortimer Jones over a drink
that afternoon. “Never lost a ball! Willing! Intelligent! Quiet! Honest!
Grateful!”

The little girl who had done this was eleven–beautifully ugly as little
girls are apt to be who are destined after a few years to be inexpressibly
lovely and bring no end of misery to a great number of men. The spark,
however, was perceptible. There was a general ungodliness in the way her
lips twisted ,down at the corners when she smiled, and in the–Heaven
help us!–in the almost passionate quality of her eyes. Vitality is born
early in such women. It was utterly in evidence now, shining through her
thin frame in a sort of glow.

She had come eagerly out on to the course at nine o’clock with a white
linen nurse and five small new golf-clubs in a white canvas bag which the
nurse was carrying. When Dexter first saw her she was standing by the
caddy house, rather ill at ease and trying to conceal the fact by engaging
her nurse in an obviously unnatural conversation graced by startling and
irrelevant grimaces from herself.

“Well, it’s certainly a nice day, Hilda,” Dexter heard her say. She drew
down the corners of her mouth, smiled, and glanced furtively around, her
eyes in transit falling for an instant on Dexter.

Then to the nurse:

“Well, I guess there aren’t very many people out here this morning, are
there?”

The smile again–radiant, blatantly artificial–convincing.

“I don’t know what we’re supposed to do now,” said the nurse, looking
nowhere in particular.

“Oh, that’s all right. I’ll fix it up.

Dexter stood perfectly still, his mouth slightly ajar. He knew that if he
moved forward a step his stare would be in her line of vision–if he
moved backward he would lose his full view of her face. For a moment he
had not realized how young she was. Now he remembered having seen
her several times the year before in bloomers.

Suddenly, involuntarily, he laughed, a short abrupt laugh– then, startled
by himself, he turned and began to walk quickly away.

“Boy!”

Dexter stopped.

“Boy—-”

Beyond question he was addressed. Not only that, but he was treated to
that absurd smile, that preposterous smile–the memory of which at least
a dozen men were to carry into middle age.

“Boy, do you know where the golf teacher is?”

“He’s giving a lesson.”

“Well, do you know where the caddy-master is?”

“He isn’t here yet this morning.”

“Oh.” For a moment this baffled her. She stood alternately on her right
and left foot.

“We’d like to get a caddy,” said the nurse. “Mrs. Mortimer Jones sent us
out to play golf, and we don’t know how without we get a caddy.”

Here she was stopped by an ominous glance from Miss Jones, followed
immediately by the smile.

“There aren’t any caddies here except me,” said Dexter to the nurse, “and
I got to stay here in charge until the caddy-master gets here.”

“Oh.”

Miss Jones and her retinue now withdrew, and at a proper distance from
Dexter became involved in a heated conversation, which was concluded
by Miss Jones taking one of the clubs and hitting it on the ground with
violence. For further emphasis she raised it again and was about to bring
it down smartly upon the nurse’s bosom, when the nurse seized the club
and twisted it from her hands.

“You damn little mean old thing!” cried Miss Jones wildly.

Another argument ensued. Realizing that the elements of the comedy
were implied in the scene, Dexter several times began to laugh, but each
time restrained the laugh before it reached audibility. He could not resist
the monstrous conviction that the little girl was justified in beating the
nurse.

The situation was resolved by the fortuitous appearance of the
caddymaster, who was appealed to immediately by the nurse.

“Miss Jones is to have a little caddy, and this one says he can’t go.”

“Mr. McKenna said I was to wait here till you came,” said Dexter quickly.

“Well, he’s here now.” Miss Jones smiled cheerfully at the caddy-master.
Then she dropped her bag and set off at a haughty mince toward the first
tee.

“Well?” The caddy-master turned to Dexter. “What you standing there like
a dummy for? Go pick up the young lady’s clubs.”

“I don’t think I’ll go out to-day,” said Dexter.

“You don’t—-”

“I think I’ll quit.”

The enormity of his decision frightened him. He was a favorite caddy, and
the thirty dollars a month he earned through the summer were not to be
made elsewhere around the lake. But he had received a strong emotional
shock, and his perturbation required a violent and immediate outlet.

It is not so simple as that, either. As so frequently would be the case in
the future, Dexter was unconsciously dictated to by his winter dreams.

II

NOW, OF COURSE, the quality and the seasonability of these winter
dreams varied, but the stuff of them remained. They persuaded Dexter
several years later to pass up a business course at the State university–
his father, prospering now, would have paid his way–for the precarious
advantage of attending an older and more famous university in the East,
where he was bothered by his scanty funds. But do not get the
impression, because his winter dreams happened to be concerned at first
with musings on the rich, that there was anything merely snobbish in the
boy. He wanted not association with glittering things and glittering
people–he wanted the glittering things themselves. Often he reached
out for the best without knowing why he wanted it–and sometimes he
ran up against the mysterious denials and prohibitions in which life
indulges. It is with one of those denials and not with his career as a whole
that this story deals.

He made money. It was rather amazing. After college he went to the city
from which Black Bear Lake draws its wealthy patrons. When he was only
twenty-three and had been there not quite two years, there were already
people who liked to say: “Now there’s a boy–” All about him rich men’s
sons were peddling bonds precariously, or investing patrimonies
precariously, or plodding through the two dozen volumes of the “George
Washington Commercial Course,” but Dexter borrowed a thousand dollars
on his college degree and his confident mouth, and bought a partnership
in a laundry.

It was a small laundry when he went into it but Dexter made a specialty of
learning how the English washed fine woollen golf-stockings without
shrinking them, and within a year he was catering to the trade that wore
knickerbockers. Men were insisting that their Shetland hose and sweaters
go to his laundry just as they had insisted on a caddy who could find
golfballs. A little later he was doing their wives’ lingerie as well–and
running five branches in different parts of the city. Before he was twenty-
seven he owned the largest string of laundries in his section of the
country. It was then that he sold out and went to New York. But the part
of his story that concerns us goes back to the days when he was making
his first big success.

When he was twenty-three Mr. Hart–one of the gray-haired men who
like to say “Now there’s a boy”–gave him a guest card to the Sherry

Island Golf Club for a week-end. So he signed his name one day on the
register, and that afternoon played golf in a foursome with Mr. Hart and
Mr. Sandwood and Mr. T. A. Hedrick. He did not consider it necessary to
remark that he had once carried Mr. Hart’s bag over this same links, and
that he knew every trap and gully with his eyes shut–but he found
himself glancing at the four caddies who trailed them, trying to catch a
gleam or gesture that would remind him of himself, that would lessen the
gap which lay between his present and his past.

It was a curious day, slashed abruptly with fleeting, familiar impressions.
One minute he had the sense of being a trespasser–in the next he was
impressed by the tremendous superiority he felt toward Mr. T. A. Hedrick,
who was a bore and not even a good golfer any more.

Then, because of a ball Mr. Hart lost near the fifteenth green, an
enormous thing happened. While they were searching the stiff grasses of
the rough there was a clear call of “Fore!” from behind a hill in their rear.
And as they all turned abruptly from their search a bright new ball sliced
abruptly over the hill and caught Mr. T. A. Hedrick in the abdomen.

“By Gad!” cried Mr. T. A. Hedrick, “they ought to put some of these crazy
women off the course. It’s getting to be outrageous.”

A head and a voice came up together over the hill:

“Do you mind if we go through?”

“You hit me in the stomach!” declared Mr. Hedrick wildly.

“Did I?” The girl approached the group of men. “I’m sorry. I yelled ‘Fore !'”

Her glance fell casually on each of the men–then scanned the fairway for
her ball.

“Did I bounce into the rough?”

It was impossible to determine whether this question was ingenuous or
malicious. In a moment, however, she left no doubt, for as her partner
came up over the hill she called cheerfully:

“Here I am! I’d have gone on the green except that I hit something.”

As she took her stance for a short mashie shot, Dexter looked at her
closely. She wore a blue gingham dress, rimmed at throat and shoulders
with a white edging that accentuated her tan. The quality of

exaggeration, of thinness, which had made her passionate eyes and
down-turning mouth absurd at eleven, was gone now. She was
arrestingly beautiful. The color in her cheeks was centered like the color
in a picture–it was not a “high” color, but a sort of fluctuating and
feverish warmth, so shaded that it seemed at any moment it would
recede and disappear. This color and the mobility of her mouth gave a
continual impression of flux, of intense life, of passionate vitality–
balanced only partially by the sad luxury of her eyes.

She swung her mashie impatiently and without interest, pitching the ball
into a sand-pit on the other side of the green. With a quick, insincere
smile and a careless “Thank you!” she went on after it.

“That Judy Jones!” remarked Mr. Hedrick on the next tee, as they waited–
some moments–for her to play on ahead. “All she needs is to be turned
up and spanked for six months and then to be married off to an
oldfashioned cavalry captain.”

“My God, she’s good-looking!” said Mr. Sandwood, who was just over
thirty.

“Good-looking!” cried Mr. Hedrick contemptuously, “she always looks as
if she wanted to be kissed! Turning those big cow-eyes on every calf in
town!”

It was doubtful if Mr. Hedrick intended a reference to the maternal
instinct.

“She’d play pretty good golf if she’d try,” said Mr. Sandwood.

“She has no form,” said Mr. Hedrick solemnly.

“She has a nice figure,” said Mr. Sandwood.

“Better thank the Lord she doesn’t drive a swifter ball,” said Mr. Hart,
winking at Dexter.

Later in the afternoon the sun went down with a riotous swirl of gold and
varying blues and scarlets, and left the dry, rustling night of Western
summer. Dexter watched from the veranda of the Golf Club, watched the
even overlap of the waters in the little wind, silver molasses under the
harvest-moon. Then the moon held a finger to her lips and the lake
became a clear pool, pale and quiet. Dexter put on his bathing-suit and
swam out to the farthest raft, where he stretched dripping on the wet
canvas of the springboard.

There was a fish jumping and a star shining and the lights around the
lake were gleaming. Over on a dark peninsula a piano was playing the
songs of last summer and of summers before that– songs from “Chin-
Chin” and “The Count of Luxemburg” and “The Chocolate Soldier”–and
because the sound of a piano over a stretch of water had always seemed
beautiful to Dexter he lay perfectly quiet and listened.

The tune the piano was playing at that moment had been gay and new
five years before when Dexter was a sophomore at college. They had
played it at a prom once when he could not afford the luxury of proms,
and he had stood outside the gymnasium and listened. The sound of the
tune precipitated in him a sort of ecstasy and it was with that ecstasy he
viewed what happened to him now. It was a mood of intense
appreciation, a sense that, for once, he was magnificently attune to life
and that everything about him was radiating a brightness and a glamour
he might never know again.

A low, pale oblong detached itself suddenly from the darkness of the
Island, spitting forth the reverberate sound of a racing motor-boat. Two
white streamers of cleft water rolled themselves out behind it and almost
immediately the boat was beside him, drowning out the hot tinkle of the
piano in the drone of its spray. Dexter raising himself on his arms was
aware of a figure standing at the wheel, of two dark eyes regarding him
over the lengthening space of water–then the boat had gone by and was
sweeping in an immense and purposeless circle of spray round and round
in the middle of the lake. With equal eccentricity one of the circles
flattened out and headed back toward the raft.

“Who’s that?” she called, shutting off her motor. She was so near now that
Dexter could see her bathing-suit, which consisted apparently of pink
rompers.

The nose of the boat bumped the raft, and as the latter tilted rakishly he
was precipitated toward her. With different degrees of interest they
recognized each other.

“Aren’t you one of those men we played through this afternoon?” she
demanded.

He was.

“Well, do you know how to drive a motor-boat? Because if you do I wish
you’d drive this one so I can ride on the surf-board behind. My name is
Judy Jones”–she favored him with an absurd smirk–rather, what tried to

be a smirk, for, twist her mouth as she might, it was not grotesque, it
was merely beautiful–“and I live in a house over there on the Island, and
in that house there is a man waiting for me. When he drove up at the
door I drove out of the dock because he says I’m his ideal.”

There was a fish jumping and a star shining and the lights around the
lake were gleaming. Dexter sat beside Judy Jones and she explained how
her boat was driven. Then she was in the water, swimming to the floating
surfboard with a sinuous crawl. Watching her was without effort to the
eye, watching a branch waving or a sea-gull flying. Her arms, burned to
butternut, moved sinuously among the dull platinum ripples, elbow
appearing first, casting the forearm back with a cadence of falling water,
then reaching out and down, stabbing a path ahead.

They moved out into the lake; turning, Dexter saw that she was kneeling
on the low rear of the now uptilted surf-board.

“Go faster,” she called, “fast as it’ll go.”

Obediently he jammed the lever forward and the white spray mounted at
the bow. When he looked around again the girl was standing up on the
rushing board, her arms spread wide, her eyes lifted toward the moon.

“It’s awful cold,” she shouted. “What’s your name?”

He told her.

“Well, why don’t you come to dinner to-morrow night?”

His heart turned over like the fly-wheel of the boat, and, for the second
time, her casual whim gave a new direction to his life.

V

NEXT EVENING while he waited for her to come down-stairs, Dexter
peopled the soft deep summer room and the sun-porch that opened
from it with the men who had already loved Judy Jones. He knew the sort
of men they were–the men who when he first went to college had
entered from the great prep schools with graceful clothes and the deep
tan of healthy summers. He 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 they eternally sprang.

When the time had come for him to wear good clothes, he had known
who were the best tailors in America, and the best tailors in America had
made him the suit he wore this evening. He had acquired that particular
reserve peculiar to his university, that set it off from other universities.
He recognized the value to him of such a mannerism and he had adopted
it; he knew that to be careless in dress and manner required more
confidence than to be careful. But carelessness was for his children. His
mother’s name had been Krimslich. She was a Bohemian of the peasant
class and she had talked broken English to the end of her days. Her son
must keep to the set patterns.

At a little after seven Judy Jones came down-stairs. She wore a blue silk
afternoon dress, and he was disappointed at first that she had not put on
something more elaborate. This feeling was accentuated when, after a
brief greeting, she went to the door of a butler’s pantry and pushing it
open called: “You can serve dinner, Martha.” He had rather expected that
a butler would announce dinner, that there would be a cocktail. Then he
put these thoughts behind him as they sat down side by side on a lounge
and looked at each other.

“Father and mother won’t be here,” she said thoughtfully.

He remembered the last time he had seen her father, and he was glad the
parents were not to be here to-night–they might wonder who he was.
He had been born in Keeble, a Minnesota village fifty miles farther north,
and he always gave Keeble as his home instead of Black Bear Village.
Country towns were well enough to come from if they weren’t
inconveniently in sight and used as footstools by fashionable lakes.

They talked of his university, which she had visited frequently during the
past two years, and of the near-by city which supplied Sherry Island with
its patrons, and whither Dexter would return next day to his prospering
laundries.

During dinner she slipped into a moody depression which gave Dexter a
feeling of uneasiness. Whatever petulance she uttered in her throaty voice
worried him. Whatever she smiled at–at him, at a chicken liver, at
nothing–it disturbed him that her smile could have no root in mirth, or
even in amusement. When the scarlet corners of her lips curved down, it
was less a smile than an invitation to a kiss.

Then, after dinner, she led him out on the dark sun-porch and
deliberately changed the atmosphere.

“Do you mind if I weep a little?” she said.

“I’m afraid I’m boring you,” he responded quickly.

“You’re not. I like you. But I’ve just had a terrible afternoon. There was a
man I cared about, and this afternoon he told me out of a clear sky that
he was poor as a church-mouse. He’d never even hinted it before. Does
this sound horribly mundane?”

“Perhaps he was afraid to tell you.”

“Suppose he was,” she answered. “He didn’t start right. You see, if I’d
thought of him as poor–well, I’ve been mad about loads of poor men,
and fully intended to marry them all. But in this case, I hadn’t thought of
him that way, and my interest in him wasn’t strong enough to survive the
shock. As if a girl calmly informed her fianc_ that she was a widow. He
might not object to widows, but—-

“Let’s start right,” she interrupted herself suddenly. “Who are you,
anyhow?”

For a moment Dexter hesitated. Then:

“I’m nobody,” he announced. “My career is largely a matter of futures.”

“Are you poor?”

“No,” he said frankly, “I’m probably making more money than any man my
age in the Northwest. I know that’s an obnoxious remark, but you advised
me to start right.”

There was a pause. Then she smiled and the corners of her mouth
drooped and an almost imperceptible sway brought her closer to him,
looking up into his eyes. A lump rose in Dexter’s throat, and he waited
breathless for the experiment, facing the unpredictable compound that
would form mysteriously from the elements of their lips. Then he saw–
she communicated her excitement to him, lavishly, deeply, with kisses
that were not a promise but a fulfillment. They aroused in him not hunger
demanding renewal but surfeit that would demand more surfeit . . .
kisses that were like charity, creating want by holding back nothing at all.

It did not take him many hours to decide that he had wanted Judy Jones
ever since he was a proud, desirous little boy.

IV

IT BEGAN like that–and continued, with varying shades of intensity, on
such a note right up to the d_nouement. Dexter surrendered a part of
himself to the most direct and unprincipled personality with which he had
ever come in contact. Whatever Judy wanted, she went after with the full
pressure of her charm. There was no divergence of method, no jockeying
for position or premeditation of effects–there was a very little mental
side to any of her affairs. She simply made men conscious to the highest
degree of her physical loveliness. Dexter had no desire to change her.
Her deficiencies were knit up with a passionate energy that transcended
and justified them.

When, as Judy’s head lay against his shoulder that first night, she
whispered, “I don’t know what’s the matter with me. Last night I thought I
was in love with a man and to-night I think I’m in love with you—-“–it
seemed to him a beautiful and romantic thing to say. It was the exquisite
excitability that for the moment he controlled and owned. But a week
later he was compelled to view this same quality in a different light. She
took him in her roadster to a picnic supper, and after supper she
disappeared, likewise in her roadster, with another man. Dexter became
enormously upset and was scarcely able to be decently civil to the other
people present. When she assured him that she had not kissed the other
man, he knew she was lying–yet he was glad that she had taken the
trouble to lie to him.

He was, as he found before the summer ended, one of a varying dozen
who circulated about her. Each of them had at one time been favored
above all others–about half of them still basked in the solace of
occasional sentimental revivals. Whenever one showed signs of dropping
out through long neglect, she granted him a brief honeyed hour, which
encouraged him to tag along for a year or so longer. Judy made these
forays upon the helpless and defeated without malice, indeed half
unconscious that there was anything mischievous in what she did.

When a new man came to town every one dropped out–dates were
automatically cancelled.

The helpless part of trying to do anything about it was that she did it all
herself. She was not a girl who could be “won” in the kinetic sense–she
was proof against cleverness, she was proof against charm; if any of
these assailed her too strongly she would immediately resolve the affair
to a physical basis, and under the magic of her physical splendor the
strong as well as the brilliant played her game and not their own. She was
entertained only by the gratification of her desires and by the direct
exercise of her own charm. Perhaps from so much youthful love, so many

youthful lovers, she had come, in self-defense, to nourish herself wholly
from within.

Succeeding Dexter’s first exhilaration came restlessness and
dissatisfaction. The helpless ecstasy of losing himself in her was opiate
rather than tonic. It was fortunate for his work during the winter that
those moments of ecstasy came infrequently. Early in their acquaintance
it had seemed for a while that there was a deep and spontaneous mutual
attraction that first August, for example–three days of long evenings on
her dusky veranda, of strange wan kisses through the late afternoon, in
shadowy alcoves or behind the protecting trellises of the garden arbors,
of mornings when she was fresh as a dream and almost shy at meeting
him in the clarity of the rising day. There was all the ecstasy of an
engagement about it, sharpened by his realization that there was no
engagement. It was during those three days that, for the first time, he
had asked her to marry him. She said “maybe some day,” she said “kiss
me,” she said “I’d like to marry you,” she said “I love you”–she said–
nothing.

The three days were interrupted by the arrival of a New York man who
visited at her house for half September. To Dexter’s agony, rumor
engaged them. The man was the son of the president of a great trust
company. But at the end of a month it was reported that Judy was
yawning. At a dance one night she sat all evening in a motor-boat with a
local beau, while the New Yorker searched the club for her frantically. She
told the local beau that she was bored with her visitor, and two days later
he left. She was seen with him at the station, and it was reported that he
looked very mournful indeed.

On this note the summer ended. Dexter was twenty-four, and he found
himself increasingly in a position to do as he wished. He joined two clubs
in the city and lived at one of them. Though he was by no means an
integral part of the stag-lines at these clubs, he managed to be on hand
at dances where Judy Jones was likely to appear. He could have gone out
socially as much as he liked–he was an eligible young man, now, and
popular with down-town fathers. His confessed devotion to Judy Jones
had rather solidified his position. But he had no social aspirations and
rather despised the dancing men who were always on tap for the
Thursday or Saturday parties and who filled in at dinners with the
younger married set. Already he was playing with the idea of going East
to New York. He wanted to take Judy Jones with him. No disillusion as to
the world in which she had grown up could cure his illusion as to her
desirability.

Remember that–for only in the light of it can what he did for her be
understood.

Eighteen months after he first met Judy Jones he became engaged to
another girl. Her name was Irene Scheerer, and her father was one of the
men who had always believed in Dexter. Irene was light-haired and sweet
and honorable, and a little stout, and she had two suitors whom she
pleasantly relinquished when Dexter formally asked her to marry him.

Summer, fall, winter, spring, another summer, another fall– so much he
had given of his active life to the incorrigible lips of Judy Jones. She had
treated him with interest, with encouragement, with malice, with
indifference, with contempt. She had inflicted on him the innumerable
little slights and indignities possible in such a case–as if in revenge for
having ever cared for him at all. She had beckoned him and yawned at
him and beckoned him again and he had responded often with bitterness
and narrowed eyes. She had brought him ecstatic happiness and
intolerable agony of spirit. She had caused him untold inconvenience and
not a little trouble. She had insulted him, and she had ridden over him,
and she had played his interest in her against his interest in his work–
for fun. She had done everything to him except to criticise him–this she
had not done– it seemed to him only because it might have sullied the
utter indifference she manifested and sincerely felt toward him.

When autumn had come and gone again it occurred to him that he could
not have Judy Jones. He had to beat this into his mind but he convinced
himself at last. He lay awake at night for a while and argued it over. He
told himself the trouble and the pain she had caused him, he enumerated
her glaring deficiencies as a wife. Then he said to himself that he loved
her, and after a while he fell asleep. For a week, lest he imagined her
husky voice over the telephone or her eyes opposite him at lunch, he
worked hard and late, and at night he went to his office and plotted out
his years.

At the end of a week he went to a dance and cut in on her once. For
almost the first time since they had met he did not ask her to sit out with
him or tell her that she was lovely. It hurt him that she did not miss these
things–that was all. He was not jealous when he saw that there was a
new man to-night. He had been hardened against jealousy long before.

He stayed late at the dance. He sat for an hour with Irene Scheerer and
talked about books and about music. He knew very little about either. But
he was beginning to be master of his own time now, and he had a rather
priggish notion that he–the young and already fabulously successful
Dexter Green–should know more about such things.

That was in October, when he was twenty-five. In January, Dexter and
Irene became engaged. It was to be announced in June, and they were to
be married three months later.

The Minnesota winter prolonged itself interminably, and it was almost
May when the winds came soft and the snow ran down into Black Bear
Lake at last. For the first time in over a year Dexter was enjoying a certain
tranquility of spirit. Judy Jones had been in Florida, and afterward in Hot
Springs, and somewhere she had been engaged, and somewhere she had
broken it off. At first, when Dexter had definitely given her up, it had
made him sad that people still linked them together and asked for news
of her, but when he began to be placed at dinner next to Irene Scheerer
people didn’t ask him about her any more–they told him about her. He
ceased to be an authority on her.

May at last. Dexter walked the streets at night when the darkness was
damp as rain, wondering that so soon, with so little done, so much of
ecstasy had gone from him. May one year back had been marked by
Judy’s poignant, unforgivable, yet forgiven turbulence–it had been one
of those rare times when he fancied she had grown to care for him. That
old penny’s worth of happiness he had spent for this bushel of content.
He knew that Irene would be no more than a curtain spread behind him, a
hand moving among gleaming tea-cups, a voice calling to children . . .
fire and loveliness were gone, the magic of nights and the wonder of the
varying hours and seasons . . . slender lips, down-turning, dropping to
his lips and bearing him up into a heaven of eyes. . . . The thing was deep
in him. He was too strong and alive for it to die lightly.

In the middle of May when the weather balanced for a few days on the
thin bridge that led to deep summer he turned in one night at Irene’s
house. Their engagement was to be announced in a week now–no one
would be surprised at it. And to-night they would sit together on the
lounge at the University Club and look on for an hour at the dancers. It
gave him a sense of solidity to go with her–she was so sturdily popular,
so intensely “great.”

He mounted the steps of the brownstone house and stepped inside.

“Irene,” he called.

Mrs. Scheerer came out of the living-room to meet him.

“Dexter,” she said, “Irene’s gone up-stairs with a splitting headache. She
wanted to go with you but I made her go to bed.”

“Nothing serious, I—-”

“Oh, no. She’s going to play golf with you in the morning. You can spare
her for just one night, can’t you, Dexter?”

Her smile was kind. She and Dexter liked each other. In the living-room
he talked for a moment before he said good-night.

Returning to the University Club, where he had rooms, he stood in the
doorway for a moment and watched the dancers. He leaned against the
door-post, nodded at a man or two–yawned.

“Hello, darling.”

The familiar voice at his elbow startled him. Judy Jones had left a man
and crossed the room to him–Judy Jones, a slender enamelled doll in
cloth of gold: gold in a band at her head, gold in two slipper points at her
dress’s hem. The fragile glow of her face seemed to blossom as she
smiled at him. A breeze of warmth and light blew through the room. His
hands in the pockets of his dinner-jacket tightened spasmodically. He
was filled with a sudden excitement.

“When did you get back?” he asked casually.

“Come here and I’ll tell you about it.”

She turned and he followed her. She had been away–he could have wept
at the wonder of her return. She had passed through enchanted streets,
doing things that were like provocative music. All mysterious happenings,
all fresh and quickening hopes, had gone away with her, come back with
her now.

She turned in the doorway.

“Have you a car here? If you haven’t, I have.”

“I have a coup_.”

In then, with a rustle of golden cloth. He slammed the door. Into so many
cars she had stepped–like this–like that– her back against the leather,
so–her elbow resting on the door– waiting. She would have been soiled
long since had there been anything to soil her–except herself–but this
was her own self outpouring.

With an effort he forced himself to start the car and back into the street.
This was nothing, he must remember. She had done this before, and he
had put her behind him, as he would have crossed a bad account from
his books.

He drove slowly down-town and, affecting abstraction, traversed the
deserted streets of the business section, peopled here and there where a
movie was giving out its crowd or where consumptive or pugilistic youth
lounged in front of pool halls. The clink of glasses and the slap of hands
on the bars issued from saloons, cloisters of glazed glass and dirty yellow
light.

She was watching him closely and the silence was embarrassing, yet in
this crisis he could find no casual word with which to profane the hour. At
a convenient turning he began to zigzag back toward the University Club.

“Have you missed me?” she asked suddenly.

“Everybody missed you.”

He wondered if she knew of Irene Scheerer. She had been back only a
day–her absence had been almost contemporaneous with his
engagement.

“What a remark!” Judy laughed sadly–without sadness. She looked at him
searchingly. He became absorbed in the dashboard.

“You’re handsomer than you used to be,” she said thoughtfully. “Dexter,
you have the most rememberable eyes.”

He could have laughed at this, but he did not laugh. It was the sort of
thing that was said to sophomores. Yet it stabbed at him.

“I’m awfully tired of everything, darling.” She called every one darling,
endowing the endearment with careless, individual comraderie. “I wish
you’d marry me.”

The directness of this confused him. He should have told her now that he
was going to marry another girl, but he could not tell her. He could as
easily have sworn that he had never loved her.

“I think we’d get along,” she continued, on the same note, “unless
probably you’ve forgotten me and fallen in love with another girl.”

Her confidence was obviously enormous. She had said, in effect, that she
found such a thing impossible to believe, that if it were true he had
merely committed a childish indiscretion– and probably to show off. She
would forgive him, because it was not a matter of any moment but rather
something to be brushed aside lightly.

“Of course you could never love anybody but me,” she continued. “I like
the way you love me. Oh, Dexter, have you forgotten last year?”

“No, I haven’t forgotten.”

“Neither have I! ”

Was she sincerely moved–or was she carried along by the wave of her
own acting?

“I wish we could be like that again,” she said, and he forced himself to
answer:

“I don’t think we can.”

“I suppose not. . . . I hear you’re giving Irene Scheerer a violent rush.”

There was not the faintest emphasis on the name, yet Dexter was
suddenly ashamed.

“Oh, take me home,” cried Judy suddenly; “I don’t want to go back to that
idiotic dance–with those children.”

Then, as he turned up the street that led to the residence district, Judy
began to cry quietly to herself. He had never seen her cry before.

The dark street lightened, the dwellings of the rich loomed up around
them, he stopped his coup_ in front of the great white bulk of the
Mortimer Joneses house, somnolent, gorgeous, drenched with the
splendor of the damp moonlight. Its solidity startled him. The strong
walls, the steel of the girders, the breadth and beam and pomp of it were
there only to bring out the contrast with the young beauty beside him. It
was sturdy to accentuate her slightness–as if to show what a breeze
could be generated by a butterfly’s wing.

He sat perfectly quiet, his nerves in wild clamor, afraid that if he moved
he would find her irresistibly in his arms. Two tears had rolled down her
wet face and trembled on her upper lip.

“I’m more beautiful than anybody else,” she said brokenly, “why can’t I be
happy?” Her moist eyes tore at his stability–her mouth turned slowly
downward with an exquisite sadness: “I’d like to marry you if you’ll have
me, Dexter. I suppose you think I’m not worth having, but I’ll be so
beautiful for you, Dexter.”

A million phrases of anger, pride, passion, hatred, tenderness fought on
his lips. Then a perfect wave of emotion washed over him, carrying off
with it a sediment of wisdom, of convention, of doubt, of honor. This was
his girl who was speaking, his own, his beautiful, his pride.

“Won’t you come in?” He heard her draw in her breath sharply.

Waiting.

“All right,” his voice was trembling, “I’ll come in.

V

IT WAS STRANGE that neither when it was over nor a long time afterward
did he regret that night. Looking at it from the perspective of ten years,
the fact that Judy’s flare for him endured just one month seemed of little
importance. Nor did it matter that by his yielding he subjected himself to
a deeper agony in the end and gave serious hurt to Irene Scheerer and to
Irene’s parents, who had befriended him. There was nothing sufficiently
pictorial about Irene’s grief to stamp itself on his mind.

Dexter was at bottom hard-minded. The attitude of the city on his action
was of no importance to him, not because he was going to leave the city,
but because any outside attitude on the situation seemed superficial. He
was completely indifferent to popular opinion. Nor, when he had seen
that it was no use, that he did not possess in himself the power to move
fundamentally or to hold Judy Jones, did he bear any malice toward her.
He loved her, and he would love her until the day he was too old for
loving–but he could not have her. So he tasted the deep pain that is
reserved only for the strong, just as he had tasted for a little while the
deep happiness.

Even the ultimate falsity of the grounds upon which Judy terminated the
engagement that she did not want to “take him away” from Irene–Judy,
who had wanted nothing else–did not revolt him. He was beyond any
revulsion or any amusement.

He went East in February with the intention of selling out his laundries
and settling in New York–but the war came to America in March and

changed his plans. He returned to the West, handed over the
management of the business to his partner, and went into the first
officers’ training-camp in late April. He was one of those young
thousands who greeted the war with a certain amount of relief,
welcoming the liberation from webs of tangled emotion.

VI

THIS STORY is not his biography, remember, although things creep into it
which have nothing to do with those dreams he had when he was young.
We are almost done with them and with him now. There is only one more
incident to be related here, and it happens seven years farther on.

It took place in New York, where he had done well–so well that there
were no barriers too high for him. He was thirty-two years old, and,
except for one flying trip immediately after the war, he had not been West
in seven years. A man named Devlin from Detroit came into his office to
see him in a business way, and then and there this incident occurred, and
closed out, so to speak, this particular side of his life.

“So you’re from the Middle West,” said the man Devlin with careless
curiosity. “That’s funny–I thought men like you were probably born and
raised on Wall Street. You know–wife of one of my best friends in Detroit
came from your city. I was an usher at the wedding.”

Dexter waited with no apprehension of what was coming.

“Judy Simms,” said Devlin with no particular interest; “Judy Jones she was
once.”

“Yes, I knew her.” A dull impatience spread over him. He had heard, of
course, that she was married–perhaps deliberately he had heard no
more.

“Awfully nice girl,” brooded Devlin meaninglessly, “I’m sort of sorry for
her.”

“Why?” Something in Dexter was alert, receptive, at once.

“Oh, Lud Simms has gone to pieces in a way. I don’t mean he ill-uses her,
but he drinks and runs around ”

“Doesn’t she run around?”

“No. Stays at home with her kids.”

“Oh.”

“She’s a little too old for him,” said Devlin.

“Too old!” cried Dexter. “Why, man, she’s only twenty-seven.”

He was possessed with a wild notion of rushing out into the streets and
taking a train to Detroit. He rose to his feet spasmodically.

“I guess you’re busy,” Devlin apologized quickly. “I didn’t realize—-”

“No, I’m not busy,” said Dexter, steadying his voice. “I’m not busy at all.
Not busy at all. Did you say she was– twenty-seven? No, I said she was
twenty-seven.”

“Yes, you did,” agreed Devlin dryly.

“Go on, then. Go on.”

“What do you mean?”

“About Judy Jones.”

Devlin looked at him helplessly.

“Well, that’s, I told you all there is to it. He treats her like the devil. Oh,
they’re not going to get divorced or anything. When he’s particularly
outrageous she forgives him. In fact, I’m inclined to think she loves him.
She was a pretty girl when she first came to Detroit.”

A pretty girl! The phrase struck Dexter as ludicrous

“Isn’t she–a pretty girl, any more?”

“Oh, she’s all right.”

“Look here,” said Dexter, sitting down suddenly, “I don’t understand. You
say she was a ‘pretty girl’ and now you say she’s ‘all right.’ I don’t
understand what you mean–Judy Jones wasn’t a pretty girl, at all. She
was a great beauty. Why, I knew her, I knew her. She was—-”

Devlin laughed pleasantly.

“I’m not trying to start a row,” he said. “I think Judy’s a nice girl and I like
her. I can’t understand how a man like Lud Simms could fall madly in love
with her, but he did.” Then he added: “Most of the women like her.”

Dexter looked closely at Devlin, thinking wildly that there must be a
reason for this, some insensitivity in the man or some private malice.

“Lots of women fade just like that,” Devlin snapped his fingers. “You must
have seen it happen. Perhaps I’ve forgotten how pretty she was at her
wedding. I’ve seen her so much since then, you see. She has nice eyes.”

A sort of dulness settled down upon Dexter. For the first time in his life
he felt like getting very drunk. He knew that he was laughing loudly at
something Devlin had said, but he did not know what it was or why it was
funny. When, in a few minutes, Devlin went he lay down on his lounge
and looked out the window at the New York sky-line into which the sun
was sinking in dull lovely shades of pink and gold.

He had thought that having nothing else to lose he was invulnerable at
last–but he knew that he had just lost something more, as surely as if he
had married Judy Jones and seen her fade away before his eyes.

The dream was gone. Something had been taken from him. In a sort of
panic he pushed the palms of his hands into his eyes and tried to bring
up a picture of the waters lapping on Sherry Island and the moonlit
veranda, and gingham on the golf-links and the dry sun and the gold
color of her neck’s soft down. And her mouth damp to his kisses and her
eyes plaintive with melancholy and her freshness like new fine linen in
the morning. Why, these things were no longer in the world! They had
existed and they existed no longer.

For the first time in years the tears were streaming down his face. But
they were for himself now. He did not care about mouth and eyes and
moving hands. He wanted to care, and he could not care. For he had gone
away and he could never go back any more. The gates were closed, the
sun was gone down, and there was no beauty but the gray beauty of steel
that withstands all time. Even the grief he could have borne was left
behind in the country of illusion, of youth, of the richness of life, where
his winter dreams had flourished.

“Long ago,” he said, “long ago, there was something in me, but now that
thing is gone. Now that thing is gone, that thing is gone. I cannot cry. I
cannot care. That thing will come back no more.”