Lesson Content : Tuesday 22nd November : Pages 16 to 21

In the lesson today we recapped the action of the first 16 pages of the play. I asked you to work in pairs in order to answer the followign questions:

• What do you learn about Willy and Linda's relationship from their conversation on page 13?
• In what ways are Biff and Happy's differences shown in the stage directions before they appear on page 14?
• What does Biff and Happy's conversation between pages 14 and 16 ("And still - that's how you build a future.") reveal about:
• Their relationship with each other?
• Their relationship with their father?

We had some useful discussion about the nature of Willy and Linda's relationship - I think we agreed that it seems to be a relationship built on love and affection - as well as thinking about the ways in which Biff and Happy differ. It was interesting to see you recognising that there appear to be some contradictions between what Miller tells us of the brothers and how they then appear to act.

Biff and Happy have a seemingly close relationshp and they appear to be very comfortable in each other's company. They talk about girls and their hopes and dreams.

In the second part of the lesson you read in pairs to page 21 where Biff and Happy go to sleep. I put it to you that Happy appears to be a bit of a 'scumbag' during this conversation as he openly admits to being promiscuous. He says he 'hates' himself for behaving in the way he does but also says "I love it." Again, this seems to be a contradiction.

Homework

What have you learnt about the character of X so far?

250 (ish) words in your red books please. Hand this in on Thursday so I can mark your fine efforts.