The Theme of Self Deception

The theme of self-deception has been explored fully in the family of Willy Loman. This is especially evident in the beliefs of Willy Loman, who is ever hopeful and never acts on his wishes. In fact, in the whole story, Willy cannot distinguish reality from illusion. This is evident in the book when Willy Loman and his sons believe that they are great people and in the society and they have all the qualities to make them successful in the business world. This s however not the case, Willy and his sons are actually not great people in the society and they had nothing to make them great people. They in fact failed in business.

Willy Loman believed that for one to be liked, and then he or she is successful. This believe of Willy made him struggle to be liked by people while showing no signs of being successful. There are also times when Willy goes into flashbacks and conversations that occurred years ago. This shows Willy was most of the time living a virtual life that had no reality; in fact, he was always living in his pasts. The aspect of Willy thinking that he is liked made him even have extra marital affairs with whores, and he thought he was great by doing this, however, this was actually one of his big downfalls (Miller, 1930).

At the time that Willy takes away his life, he is actually driven to committing suicide by the aspect of self deception. Self deception drives Willy to believe that a man can be worth more death than alive. It is this deception that drives Willy to eventually commit suicide. If Willy had any form of reality in his life, he could have seen the need of being alive to chase after his dreams of being a great business person.

Willy Loman lived a life full of self deception. He had dreams, which he did not put in efforts to achieve. When he was offered a good paying job by his very rich and successful neighbor, Willy turns down the offer without giving any reasons. He in fact lived with a personal pride that never paid him any returns. This was the best chance for Willy to pursue a new life full reality, he however never saw this chance but went ahead to lose it and continue living life full of misery and confusing. This later prompted him to commit suicide (Miller, 1930).

There is no doubt that the sons and wife of Willy Loman were also living life full of self deception. They followed the confused life of Willy al the time until the time he committed suicide. They never informed him to stop dreaming and live a life full of reality. In fact after the death of Willy, the wife sits at his grave wondering why Willy decided to take his life away. In fact this is a clear indicator of the dysfunctional values of the American society that led him to preferring death to life (Miller, 1930).

It is very evident that the whole of the Loman family was living a life of self deception when they start living a life full of regrets after the death of Willy Loman. In fact, all of them feel that they had made very many mistakes in the past and lived a life away from reality by following their father. In fact Biff, Willy’s son looks back in life when his father was confused and a cheat but he still idolized him. This is strong reason to show that the whole family lived a life full of self deception.