Death Of A Traveling Salesman Essay, Research Paper

Death Of A Traveling Salesman

In the short narrative, Death Of A Traveling Salesman, R. J. Bowman is a successful salesman with the purpose to acquire place after being ill and in the infirmary. He faces many obstructions along the manner. Even though R. J. Bowman knows that there is something losing in his life he has no desire to seek and convey it into his life. He realizes he is merely a salesman and that is all he will of all time be. There are symbols in the narrative that show a shadow over Bowman s life. Darkness is the most important that occurs throughout the narrative, and visible radiation is besides a important portion of the narrative. Mr. Bowman likes to cover up his true feelings by disregarding them or literally covering them up. Through the symbolism of darkness and visible radiation, Eudora Welty shows the world of the loveless nothingness in R. J. Bowman s life.

From the beginning of the narrative the darkness of Bowman s state of affairs reflects the emptiness of his yesteryear and the desolation of his hereafter. Bowman is a salesman who is merely acquiring out of the infirmary retrieving from an unwellness. An unwellness that is causes him to bury the manner to Beulah. Driving down the route Bowman stuck his caput out of the dust-covered auto to gaze up the route ( 204 ) , this is the first mark of dark symbolism. There is a dust-covered residue on his auto and he is seeking to see out of his window, the window of life. There is something in his life that is nebulose, or there is something losing in his life. He is standing at the beginning of his life looking down a soil way that merely has one path, which is endeavoring to be the best salesman he can be, and nil more.

Bowman s life has two parts to it, half of his life is happy and the other half is full of darkness and unhappiness. After his auto goes into the ditch he goes to a house and knocks on the door. An old adult female opens the door keeping a lamp and he notices that the lamp she holds is half blackened, half clear & # 8230 ; ( 208 ) . The lamp is a symbol that there is a portion of his life that is voided out and non thought approximately frequently, or non at all. He is a one-minded individual ; he has his head on being a great man of affairs and merchandising places. The half clean portion of the lamp resembles one half of his life ; the half of his life that is bright and headed on the right way, for illustration, him being a successful salesman is the clean portion of the lamp. It is his lit portion of his life because he is successful. The blackened portion of his life is the empty portion of his life, which could in bend be the deficiency of being loved or the ability to love person or something else besides selling places.

He goes into the house and sits while the adult female tells him that her hubby, Sonny, will be home to acquire his auto out. While walking in the house the darkness of the house touched him & # 8230 ; ( 210 ) , intending that the darkness of the house had a presence of emptiness, which was a resemblance of his life. He had no thought why the house touched him, he could merely inquire. The adult female set the half cleaned lamp on a tabular array in

the centre of the room ( 210 ) , which resembles his life that revolves around this dark cloud over his life, where something is losing, something that he has ne’er experienced before. The clean portion of the lamp resembles the happy portion of his life, like his shoe merchandising concern and being a successful salesman. Bing a great and complete salesman was an indispensable portion of his life. With the lamp non being lit the illness has taken over his life for a period of clip and he is non able to be happy because there is still that darkness and now a new darkness that is maintaining him from selling places.

As he is sitting in the house Bowman realizes how lonely he is, and he thinks about how his bosom is empty and has no love. He wants to be loved and he wants person to come into his life and love him, and he wants to love him or her dorsum. He goes to the window with the adult female and sees a white pinpoint floated swimmingly toward her finger, like a foliage on a river, turning whiter in the dark ( 216 ) . This is the first symbol of visible radiation used in the narrative. Bowman is eventually recognizing how lonely he is, by looking at the pinpoint of light outside he is fundamentally seeing the visible radiation he is opening his head to a whole new universe of love which is something he has ne’er felt before. The light represents the love that he has been hankering for but has been concealing from. Soon after the adult female lit the lamp it showed its dark and visible radiation ( 218 ) . With the adult female illuming the lamp he realizes the consequence of the dark cloud over his life. He knows he has ne’er felt love before and he doesn t cognize if he can of all time love. There is still that nothingness of emptiness in his bosom, that may ne’er be filled.

Bowman starts to experience unwanted in the house, because he finds out that Sonny and the adult female are married and are traveling to hold a kid. As he is walking out to his auto, he started to experience awfully ill. He covered his bosom with both custodies to maintain anyone from hearing the noise it made. But nobody heard it ( 222 ) . He covered his bosom so no 1 could hear the sound of an achy bosom. It was the sound of a bosom that was empty of no love and would ne’er be loved, and one that would ne’er give love unless it was for concern. He covered his bosom as he has done all his life, he has covered up the darkness so no 1 else could see it, and so no 1 could seek and assist him. He did non desire to be loved he wanted to be a salesman and a salesman merely.

Welty uses symbolism such as darkness and visible radiation to demo R. J. Bowman s battles of solitariness that he notices while he is ill and lost. He finds that he is a salesman that can ne’er love nor be loved. By covering his bosom in the terminal of the narrative the reader discovers that he will ne’er be loved, and he dies an unloved salesman. He dies with half of his life in darkness and the other half lighted. He dies a half happy, half sad salesman.

Work Cited

Welty, E. Death Of A Traveling Salesman. Selected Short Narratives of Eudora Welty. Ed. Katherine Anne Porter. Random House, Inc erectile dysfunction, 1992. 204-222.