Comparing Biff Loman And A Raisin In The Sun

Biff from Death of a Salesman and Walter ,jr, from A Raisin in the Sun , both have a common attitude towards dreams and goals in their plans. They both want the end result of success, and yet they don’t want to put forth the effort necessary to achieve their goals. Biff’s dream to be a college football player was dependent on him passing math so he could graduate and get the scholarship. Still he failed the class and instead of going to summer school, he didn’t do anything about it, letting the summer slip away along with his scholarship. Even though this was apparently due to the fact that he caught his dad cheating on his mom while on business, it still seems as if biff is not a motivated person by any means. If he really loved football
I even believed myself that id been a salesman for him!”(act 2) This Quote shows how Biff realizes that he had been lying to himself this whole time. Happy (his brother) and Biff live in a fantasy world a lot of the time and talk about how they're going to go into business together and become rich, as Walter even calls it a “million dollar idea”. When in reality they will never even come close to setting this plan in motion. The reason they even mention the idea is to make their dad feel good, and also because they just enjoy hearing their own ideas. Happy and Biff feed off of each other's enthusiasm as they go on about how the “Loman brothers” are going to go into business together. When in reality it's all talk and biff would never follow through. I feel that biff is a “yes man”, Biff will say anything to anyone to get them to be happy even if it’s not in his best interest or he simply doesn't want to do it. This is evident when Biff talks to Willy about going to see oliver to ask him in his venture to go into business. Not only do we find out at the end of the play that he doesn't want to be a salesman, he also lies to Willy about talking to him as he had backed out of talking to oliver in his office. Biff lies to Willy and say’s that the meeting with oliver went great and he was going to meet with him the next day. He does this to not only avoid confrontation with willy but to also make willy
That be ten thousand each.”(Walter ,jr,) This quote is walter explaining to his family about his possible liquor store venture. His family is definitely not too fond of his idea especially his mom who is a devout christian. It seems as though Walter doesn’t really appreciate his dad’s insurance money and just sees it more or less as a get rich scheme. Walter doesn’t want to work to get his money to open up the liquor store, but instead sees the insurance money as easy way out of having to work for something he wants. He let’s his liquor store idea get the best of him and really drive him to say and do some bad things. Similar to Biff he seem’s to have an epiphany at the end to the play realizing he was going about the liquor store all wrong. Just as Biff realizes that he never wanted to be a salesman like his dad Willy.
Both Biff and Walter are very delusional people when it comes to their dreams and future aspirations. They both are not realistic with themselves and what they want to do with their