Rude Awakening: The Collapse of the American Dream in the Death of a Salesman and Streetcar Named Desire

• Název práce v češtině: Drsné probuzení: Zhroucení amerického snu ve hrách Smrt obchodního cestujícího a Tramvaj do stanice touha
• Název v anglickém jazyce: Rude Awakening: The Collapse of the American Dream in the Death of a Salesman and Streetcar Named Desire
• Klíčová slova: americké drama|americký sen|Tennessee Williams|Arthur Miller|tragédie|Tramvaj do Stanice Touha|Smrt obchodního cestujícího|americká kultura|analýza postav|rodina|chudoba|nezávislost|vlastnictví
• Klíčová slova anglicky: American drama|American Dream|Tennessee Williams|Arthur Miller|tragedy|A Streetcar Named Desire|Death of a Salesman|American culture|character analysis|family|poverty|independence|ownership
• Akademický rok vypsání: 2020/2021
• Typ práce: bakalářská práce
• Jazyk práce: angličtina
• Ústav: Ústav anglofonních literatur a kultur (21-UALK)
• Vedoucí / školitel: doc. Clare Wallace, M.A., Ph.D.
• Řešitel: skrytý - zadáno a potvrzeno stud. odd.
• Datum přihlášení: 10.03.2021
• Datum zadání: 16.03.2021
• Schválení administrátorem: zatím neschvalováno
• Datum potvrzení stud. oddělením: 05.01.2023
• Datum a čas obhajoby: 31.01.2023 10:00
• Datum odevzdání elektronické podoby: 05.01.2023
• Datum proběhlé obhajoby: 31.01.2023
• Odevzdaná/finalizovaná: odevzdaná studentem a finalizovaná
• Oponenti: PhDr. Hana Ulmanová, Ph.D.

Zásady pro vypracování

The American Dream is a fundamental aspect of the American cultural paradigm, and its forms can be found in many essential literary works of American authors. The objective of this thesis is to examine this phenomenon in the context of the American theatre of the middle of the twentieth century, specifically in the plays Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller and A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams. These plays share a tragic ending for the protagonists who fail to achieve their own American Dreams.
This thesis examines the evolution and significance of the American Dream in American history and distinguishes three forms of the concept: the Dream of Independence, the Dream of Ownership, and the Dream of Personality. These forms are subsequently described and put into context of the discussed plays. This creates a concise survey of the American Dream as a social concept and identifies its significance in the plays.
These forms of the American Dream are explored further in A Streetcar Named Desire and Death of a Salesman. The motivations of the protagonists are connected to the American Dream through character analysis. This thesis demonstrates that their collapse is caused by their loss of faith in the ideals of the American Dream which provided identity, hope, and security. Without these values they cannot maintain their lives and they retreat into fantasy. In Death of a Salesman the protagonist goes a step further and commits suicide to preserve his idea of the American Dream.
The importance of the American Dream is captured in the plays through its destructive force which leads the protagonists into collapse. Even though the American Dream can be traced through the whole history of the United States, as a concept it is the subject of a constantly evolving struggle of the American people to define it. For this reason, the Dream is in many ways timeless and remains the subject of much contemporary attention.

Seznam odborné literatury

Primary sources:
Miller, Arthur. Death of a Salesman. Great Britain: Penguin Classics, 2015.
Williams, Tennessee. A Streetcar Named Desire. Stuttgart: Ernst Klett Sprachen, 2008.

Secondary sources:
Adler, Thomas P. A Streetcar Named Desire: The Moth and the Lantern. Boston: Twayne
Publishers, 1990.
Allen, Walter. The American Dream and Modern Man: The Urgent West. New York: Dutton,
1969.
Berkowitz, Gerald M. American Drama of the Twentieth Century. London: Longman, 1992.
Bigsby, Christopher. Modern American Drama, 1945-2000. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2000.
Centola, Steven R. “Family Values in Death of a Salesman.” CLA Journal 37, no.1 (September
1993): 29-41.
Cullen, Jim. American Dream: A Short History of an Idea That Shaped a Nation. New York:
Oxford University Press, 2003.
Emerson, Waldo Emerson. “Self-Reliance.” In Ralph Waldo Emerson: The Major Prose.
Edited by Ronald A. Bosco, and Joel Myerson. 127-151. Cambridge, MA: Harvard
University Press, 2015.
Foertsch, Jacqueline. American Culture in the 1940. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press,
2008.
Forsyth, Alison. “Re-defining the Dream on the American Stage.” In The American Dream:
Dialogues in U.S. Studies. Edited by Ricardo Miguez. 207-233. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Press, 2007.
Grieve-Carlson, Gary. “Willy Loman’s American Dream.” In The American Dream:
Dialogues in U.S. Studies. Edited by Ricardo Miguez. 194-206. Newcastle:
Cambridge Scholars Press, 2007.
Jacobs, Daniel. “Three’s a crowd: Stella’s pregnancy and the arrival of ‘other’ in A Streetcar
Named Desire.” International Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies 16, no. 3 (August 2019): 174-180.
Keim, Charles, and Antilla, Davy, “In a Field of Beans: Dreaming of This World in
American Literature.” In The American Dream: Dialogues in U.S. Studies. Edited by
Ricardo Miguez. 234-251. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Press, 2007.
Londré, Felicia Hardison. Modern American Drama. Playwriting in the 1940s: voices,
documents, new interpretations. New York: Bloomsbury Academic, 2017.
“Melting pot.” Def. Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary.
<https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/melting%20pot> 23 Nov 2022
Miguez, Ricardo. “The American Dreams: A Brief Historical Outline.” In The American
Dream: Dialogues in U.S. Studies. Edited by Ricardo Miguez. 2-33. Newcastle:
Cambridge Scholars Press, 2007.
Miller, Arthur. Salesman in Beijing. New York: Viking, 1984.
Moseley, Merritt. “Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman.” In Bloom’s Literary Themes: The
American Dream. Edited by Harold Bloom. 47-56. New York: Infobase Publishing,
2009.
Rosenberg, Emily S. Spreading the American Dream: American economic and cultural
expansion, 1890-1945. New York: Hill and Wang, 1982.
Vlasopolos, Anca. “Authorizing History: Victimization in A Streetcar Named Desire.” Theatre
Journal 38, no. 3 (October 1986): 322-338.