Symbols are objects, characters, figures, or colors
used to represent abstract ideas or concepts.
Seeds
Seeds represent for Willy the opportunity to prove the
worth of his labor, both as a salesman and a father. His desperate,
nocturnal attempt to grow vegetables signifies his shame about barely
being able to put food on the table and having nothing to leave
his children when he passes. Willy feels that he has worked hard
but fears that he will not be able to help his offspring any more
than his own abandoning father helped him. The seeds also symbolize
Willy’s sense of failure with Biff. Despite the American Dream’s
formula for success, which Willy considers infallible, Willy’s efforts
to cultivate and nurture Biff went awry. Realizing that his all-American
football star has turned into a lazy bum, Willy takes Biff’s failure
and lack of ambition as a reflection of his abilities as a father.
Diamonds
To Willy, diamonds represent tangible wealth and, hence,
both validation of one’s labor (and life) and the ability to pass
material goods on to one’s offspring, two things that Willy desperately craves.
Correlatively, diamonds, the discovery of which made Ben a fortune,
symbolize Willy’s failure as a salesman. Despite Willy’s belief
in the American Dream, a belief unwavering to the extent that he
passed up the opportunity to go with Ben to Alaska, the Dream’s promise
of financial security has eluded Willy. At the end of the play, Ben
encourages Willy to enter the “jungle” finally and retrieve this elusive
diamond—that is, to kill himself for insurance money in order to
make his life meaningful.
Linda’s and The Woman’s Stockings
Willy’s strange obsession with the condition of Linda’s
stockings foreshadows his later flashback to Biff’s discovery of
him and The Woman in their Boston hotel room. The teenage Biff accuses
Willy of giving away Linda’s stockings to The Woman. Stockings assume a
metaphorical weight as the symbol of betrayal and sexual infidelity.
New stockings are important for both Willy’s pride in being financially
successful and thus able to provide for his family and for Willy’s
ability to ease his guilt about, and suppress the memory of, his
betrayal of Linda and Biff.
The Rubber Hose
The rubber hose is a stage prop that reminds the audience
of Willy’s desperate attempts at suicide. He has apparently attempted
to kill himself by inhaling gas, which is, ironically, the very
substance essential to one of the most basic elements with which
he must equip his home for his family’s health and comfort—heat.
Literal death by inhaling gas parallels the metaphorical death that
Willy feels in his struggle to afford such a basic necessity.
