Dorothea Orems Self-Care Model Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Dorothea Orems Self-Care Model - Essay Example This theory held a number of major assumptions. The most overarching consideration was that the theory believed that people should be self-reliant and responsible for their own care. In this mode of understanding, she viewed people as distinct individuals. Orem believed that nursing was a form of action, specifically between two or more people. As Orem believed that self-care was a human need many of the theoretical tenants of this nursing theory considered ways that nurses could facilitate self-care. This theory then considered that the role of nursing was to ensure that the patient or members of their family were able to meet the patient’s care needs. Orem’s theory placed great emphasis on the notion of wholeness. This wholeness encompassed health concerns including biological, social, and symbolic elements. Orem was then concerned with establishing the differing means by which nurses could aid the patient with self-care. In this way, she was concerned with self-care, self-care agency, therapeutic self-care, and self-care requisites. Self-care agency refers to the extent that the patient is capable of taking control of their care needs. Therapeutic self-care is the â€Å"totality of self-care actions to be performed for some duration in order to meet self-care requisites by using valid methods and related sets of operations and actions† ("Dorothea Orem's self-care," 2012). Finally, self-care requisites are the steps the patient needs to take to assume greater self-care. In conclusion, these comprehensive elements formed Orem self-care theory of nursing. This model would greatly influence nursing theory throughout her time and continues to influence contemporary contexts.

YOUR LEADERSHIP PHILOSOPHY Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

YOUR LEADERSHIP PHILOSOPHY - Essay Example For a leader, it is vital to expose the employees in other areas of concern outside the office. Research analysts argue that getting out of the office is one of the ways in which the employees’ morale can be boosted. This makes the workers more enthusiastic in their jobs, and more engaged in their day to day tasks (Posner & Kouzes, 2010). For instance, outside the field, it is vital that the sailors are given a chance to work outside the office and interact with the public. However, this is only possible if the manager gives them an opportunity to show responsibility and liability in their jobs. This will minimize the chances of misconduct, since the sailors are held accountable for their actions. For a leader, interaction with the juniors is vital if the business is to thrive. This may entail joking with the juniors, an aspect that not only builds rapport between the employer and the employees but also creates a positive bond between the two parties. From the case study, it is evident that there is a huge problem in terms of command and responsibility in the Navy system. The officers are known to be of no good caliber, always in the wrong due to breach of rules. If the juniors and seniors had a chance to interact, It would be possible to have a bond forming between the parties, and, ultimately, minimizing the pressures of the job. Thirdly, both the professional and personal goals of a leader have to be balanced if their team is to succeed. In our case, the leader may adopt the system of having personal time with a different sailor on a daily basis. This would allow for the leader to understand the problems of his or her subordinates on a first hand basis. For instance, this would aid in uncovering the reasons behind the commanding officers breaking the Navy ethos and justification of their actions at any event. Probably, such employees need some attention and constant praise for the job that they do.

The Mysterious Marisa Coulter Essay Example for Free

The Mysterious Marisa Coulter Essay Phillip Pullman’s â€Å"His Dark Materials† introduces a new twist on the old villainess character to the world of fiction. Mrs. Marisa Coulter is an almost purely evil character. Despite her charming and persuasive demeanor, Mrs. Coulter is the greediest, most power-hungry character in the trilogy. In Pullman’s world, every human has a daemon—a visible version of the soul that takes on an animal form. Mrs. Coulter’s daemon, a vicious little golden monkey, reflects its owner’s personality. Only a few seconds, and the monkey had overmastered him: with one fierce black paw around his throat and his black paws gripping the polecat’s lower limbs, he took one of Pantalaimon’s ears in his other paw and pulled as if he intended to tear it off. Not angrily, either, but with a cold curious force that was horrifying to see and even worse to feel. † (Pullman, 65) Just as the monkey, in book three, enjoys torturing and killing bats in the cave in which Mrs. Coulter keeps Lyra, Mrs. Coulter enjoys toying with people before she kills them. She shows no remorse after tearing people to pieces or torturing them to death. Mrs. Coulter, according to Lord Asriel, wanted to be involved in the religious hierarchy. However, being female, this was denied her. Mrs. Coulter is very intelligent and clever, but usually works for her own ends. She is manipulative and a very convincing liar. Every act of kindness or consideration is for her benefit only. Mrs. Coulter’s daemon attacks Lyra’s daemon in an attempt to subdue Lyra into doing her bidding. Immediately following this act Pullman writes, â€Å"‘What do you think of the flowers, dear? ’ said Mrs. Coulter as sweetly as if nothing had happened† (65). She has no sense of compassion and will do almost anything to reach her goals. She is not sympathetic or sentimental, and does not particularly care how her actions affect other people. She has tortured, killed, and torn children in half all for the sake of raising herself higher. From a young age she craved power, first attempting to obtain it through marrying a wealthy politician, Edward Coulter. When her husband was killed by her lover Lord Asriel she was left with almost nothing and decided to try to get power through the Church. She decided to experiment with Dust, a new kind of elementary particle that the Church knew about, but would not experiment with because it was a feared subject. Mrs. Coulter realized that daring to do what others will not, is an extremely useful tool for gaining power. After conducting several successful experiments in the North that severed children from their daemons, and stopped Dust from gathering around them, she became one of the Churchs most powerful agents. Of all the characters in Golden Compass, Mrs. Marisa Coulter is the most morally ambiguous. Marisa Coulter has one daughter. Lyra, the protagonist of the trilogy is the product of an affair between Mrs. Coulter and Lord Asriel while Mrs. Coulter was still married to Edward Coulter. When Mr. Coulter found out his wife was having an affair he chased the baby Lyra and her nurse into a cottage where Lord Asriel came in and killed him. â€Å"There is no Mr. Coulter, by the way: she is a widow. Her husband died very sadly in an accident some years ago; so you might bear that in mind before you ask. † (53) In the months that followed, when Lyras future life was being worked out Mrs. Coulter turned her back. She wanted to distance herself as far away from her daughter and the affair as she could because it would disgrace her and ruin her chances at becoming high in society. It is assumed that she has had many lovers since then, including Lord Boreal. Mrs. Coulter’s relationship with Lord Asriel, Lyra’s father, adds another dimension to her character. The struggle between Mrs. Coulter and Lord Asriel drives much of the trilogy’s narrative. Though Mrs. Coulter and Lord Asriel battle for control of their daughter, Lyra’s existence suggests that a powerful attraction once existed, and possibly still exists, between them. It becomes apparent that Mrs. Coulter is in cahoots with the General Oblation Board, who as the Gobblers has been kidnapping children to be sent off to Bolvangar. â€Å"’Really? Is she involved with the Oblation Board? ’ ‘My dear, she is the Oblation Board. It’s entirely her own project –‘† (67) There, the kidnapped children are separated by a process called Intercision from their daemons, something like being subjected to the Dementors kiss. Mrs. Coulter captures the children by manipulating them. She gives them food, tells them her exciting stories of adventures, and generally gives warm hospitality. The children feel comfortable with her, and so they are shipped to Bolvangar before they realize what has happened. The children describe her as angelic. But, despite her cruelty, Mrs. Coulter has a soft spot for Lyra. She rescues Lyra from intercision at Bolvanger, she looks after Lyra in the cave in the Himalayas, and she fights desperately with Father MacPhail to make sure that his bomb doesn’t kill Lyra. In the end, she gives her own life to drag Metatron into the abyss so that Lyra can accomplish her goal. Mrs. Coulter’s transformation is inspired by Lyra, who evokes extraordinary love from most people she encounters. So it could be stated that Lyra melted Mrs. Coulter’s cold icy heart, not only teaching her compassion, but maybe a smidge of humility as well.

Comparison And Contrast Between Achilles And Hector History Essay

Comparison And Contrast Between Achilles And Hector History Essay Homers poem The Iliad is an epic poem that describes the majority of the war between Greek and Trojan. The purpose of this essay is to enhance our critical reading and writing skills. The mean of this is essay is compare and contrast between Achilles and Hector discussing the similarities between two protagonists of the poem the Iliad. I think its important to be sure that we have a complete understanding of the things being compared because it will be much easier to write a critical essay. The poem was written by Homer who is generally considered being one of the most important poets and authors of the eighth century. Also, Homer has had an enormous influence on the history of literature and he has a particular form of writing. To my understanding, He had the ability to perceive life in a different way because he wrote most about of the life in Greek and war their respective times. The poem the Iliad is very important and interesting because He teaches many good things about the lif e of one person during the war. The main protagonists of the Poem are Achilles who is considered as the greatest warrior in the world. Achilles is the son of Peleus, the former king of the Myrmidons, and a sea nymph named Thetis. Patroclus is Greek warrior and beloved companion of Achilles. Menelaus is King of Sparta and brother of Agamemnon and he is who his wife, Helen, was taken by prince Paris Trojan, After, was like that the Greeks declared war on Troy. Agamemnon is Commander of the Greek armies and son of Atreus, the king of Mycenae. Hector is prince of Trojan and revered the bravest of the Trojan warriors. Priam is King of Troy. Andromache is noble and dedicated wife from Hectors. Paris is Prince Trojan and who took Helen from Menelaus. Zeus is King of the gods, who prefers to remain neutral in the war but he intervenes after a plea for help. Hera is Queen of the gods, who favors the Greeks. Apollo is revered like a god of light and the sun, who sides with the Trojans. Thetis is known as the goddess of water, who is the mother of Achilles. Although exist many most protagonist but to me them are most important. (Harold Bloom) According to Egbert Haverkamp Begemann , Homer was a writer; whose writing manifests of the wars between Greek and Trojan. The Iliad, the subject is war. The Greek army has traveled to Troy to battle the Trojan army by the recused Menelaus wife Helen from Paris , resulting in a war that rages on for the better part of a ten year. To me the three most important and relevant protagonist of the Iliad is Achilles, Hector and Patroclus. Achilles fights for the Greek army and is considered the greatest of the Greek warriors. Patroclus is the most loyal commander from Achilles and considered like brother of war of the great Achilles. While Hector, who fights for the Trojan army, he is not only a prince of Troy is also considered the greatest of the Trojan warriors. Achilles and Hector are most important characters in the Iliad because they are respected and revered as heroes by all people of their side. They are different by the way that they had relationships with their families, the way that they lead their troops in the Iliad in the way that they view and interact with the power of the gods. The first contrast between Achilles and Hector is that they have different personalities and how they live their life. Hector is a man of family who loves his child and wife and he believed that Confidence, communication is important to build a good relationship with respect and love to keep the family. Also, he can forget war when a little child cries or his people suffer by the war. Whiles Achilles is ruled by his uncontrollable passions as seen in his rage and proud headstrong ways and to Achilles is evident that military glory is more important than family life. He risks his life in order to gain military glory. According, The Iliad is a poem that shown Achilles has a great love to his mother and his close friendship with Patroclus and Briseis. Achilles is a man who comes to live by and for violence (Lawall 115). Achilles was like that because he was grown with this Greek culture where always were in wars. Also, Achilles never see his lasting life was not in his future because he always was presented in all wars that the Greek have by pride and gain glory. Also, He is willing to sacrifice his life only so that his name will be remembered. For Hector, war is a necessary evil in which he fights bravely, but reluctantly (Lawall 115). While Achilles participating or fighting in wars by pride, glory and to have his name remembered, Hectors motivation is more humanistic. A great example by that Hector is considered one hero between the Trojans is because he fighting against the Achaeans is all about preventing well-being and keeps peaceful in his land. Furthermore, hector have pride but different to pride of Achilles because his pride is subdued in order to maintain his loyalty to his homeland and its people. Hectors loyalty is evident in the Iliad. Another important contrast between the characters principals of the Iliad has different ways of showing heroism. Hector is a hero in his own way. Although he died in a very dreadful way, the Trojans all celebrated him as a great hero of their time because He fought by people of his land and peace. While Achilles were possibly the most important warrior and hero of Greek time. Although, The Greeks treat Patroclus as a hero after his death, He was given a great celebration in his honor because Patroclus death is the most important influenced to that Achilles participating in the war against Trojan and so they could win the war. To me understand a great similiratlity between Achilles and hector according to Iliad, Achilles loves Briseis and Agamemnon rips her from him, without remorse. After the great Achilles doesnt believe that he should fight in it war because he was directly insulted to his pride like man when Agamemnon demanded to the love of his life Briseis. He was fury to refuse to fight against the Trojans by the fail of respect of Agamemnon to him. According the Iliad, Hectors love for his family is shown when he is shown playing with his infant son before he goes out to meet his death at the hands of Achilles. To me understand is one great example love and passion that the family has in the life of hector. Another similarity is when Achilles feeling guilty for the death of Patroclus and other Acadians who had died by the pride and choice of refused to participating in the war after the great offend by part Agamemnon. In addition, Achilles realized the consequences of his actions and He was sorry for what he had done and wanted to fix it. Then is when Achilles feels that if he kills Hector, Patroclus death will be justly avenged and he will not carry by his actions. Hector values honor and pride in his army and homeland more than he values life. For example, when he advises the citizens of Troy to sleep outside the city gates, because he assumes all is safe and then finds out people were murdered through the night because by the raging Achilles had returned, he assumes full responsibility for the disaster. If the situation had been reversed, Achilles would have pointed fingers of blame at others, but on the contrary, Hector knew that he had made a mistake and was to ashamed to return inside the gates, instead giving his live attempting the end that of the man who viciously killed so many Trojans. (Harold Bloom) this quote is important to understand the personality, values that the great hector have, courage and honor required to be recognized like a true epic hero. Hector demonstrates every quality an epic hero should. He combines his fighting abilities with integrity, humanity, and an entirely altruistic approach to every situation he faces. He honestly lives to fairly fight his best every day for the Trojans.

Armour :: Essays Papers

Armour Armour in chivalric ages was truly one of the most important aspects of life. A family could spend all the money that they had arming one of their boys. The modern day equivalent to a fully armoured knight would be a tank for the United States Army. A knight's armour was important for a number of reasons. He needed it to be good looking, protective, and well maintained. Armour could take on several forms not just the typical metal suit. It came in the form of hardened leather, chain mail and hanging metal. Chivalry could not be upheld if it were not for Armour. Armour was a key tool of the chivalric period because a knight could not uphold the code of chivalry without it. A knight was judged by the armour that he wore and how he appeared in it. There were strict rules as to how the armour was to be applied to the knight and what the squire was supposed to bring to the field of battle. This is clearly evident in the following passage taken from the SCA web site (http://www.sca.org/chivarts.html ) entitled To Arm A Man GRAFICAS First you must set the sabatons and tie them to the shoe with small points that will not break. And then the greaves and cuisses over the breeches of mail. Then place the taces upon his hips. And then the breast and back plates, the vambraces and rerebraces {the arm defenses}. And then the gauntlets. Hang the dagger on his right side, his short sword upon his left side in a round ring that it may be lightly drawn. And then put his cote upon his back. The bascinet follows, laced to the cuirass in front and back that it sits just so. And then his long sword in his hand, a small pennant bearing the figure of Saint George or Our Lady in his left hand. Now he is ready to take to the field. What an Appellant shall bring to the field:

Experiencing Pain Essay example -- Health, Philosophy, Personal Experi

Most would agree that pain is an emotion we want to avoid; however, experiencing pain has the potential for insight, knowledge, and a new understanding of life that may not have been in realization. Through experiencing or living with pain, a proper understanding of value can perhaps be brought to things that may not have been valued in a pain free life. Because of pain, the true meaning of life, what it is like to live, and the value of oneself and others is to be within one’s control. Pain is a destructive force, yet it can strengthen the mind and the spirit. As stated in Virginia Woolf’s essay on Being Ill, the true beauty of the people and the real beauty of the earth can be seen through the eyes of those who are in pain. Also according to Woolf, pain can lead to spiritual divinity. From my understanding, the power of prayer to some people is not in belief until pain has overtaken the body of oneself or of a loved one. Pain seems to open the eyes of those who have not correctly lived their lives. Small things in life are regularly overlooked due to the busy and determined career oriented lifestyles. The joys of life come through the detail of the small gestures given or received. The golden rule of â€Å"treat others the way you want to be treated,† is important for people who want to lead a happy life. Until he was deathly ill, Ivan Ilyich, the main character in The Death of Ivan Ilyich, never appreciated the small things in life. His focus was narrowed to one topic. â€Å"Ivan made work the center gravity of his life† (50). Before anything else, including his marriage, Ivan’s work and analyzing way of living was of first priority. Neither Ivan nor his friends valued one another. Ivan’s family and friends treated Ivan ... ...ckily, she survived and my passenger and I survived with minor injuries. Not a day goes by where I do not think about what happened, but I know it happened for a reason. Getting through this painful situation made me a stronger willed person. Taking things for granted is what I do not do. I truly value my life and my family’s lives. A life can be taken away at any second. Giving thanks for the joy and love in life is something that needs to be done daily. Material items are replaceable, but what is irreplaceable is a human being. Memories made will last a lifetime, but the physical presence of a loved one will be gone. The best advice is to live life to the fullest and value the sentimental belongings, especially family and friends. Pain is not an ease, but it helps ease the minds of those who are most important with respect and insight to value.

Expressionism in Death of Salesman Essay

From the opening flute notes to their final reprise, Miller’s musical themes express the competing influences in Willy Loman’s mind. Once established, the themes need only be sounded to evoke certain time frames, emotions, and values. The first sounds of the drama, the flute notes â€Å"small and fine,† represent the grass, trees, and horizon – objects of Willy’s (and Biff’s) longing that are tellingly absent from the overshadowed home on which the curtain rises. This melody plays on as Willy makes his first appearance, although, as Miller tells us, â€Å"[h]e hears but is not aware of it† (12). Through this music we are thus given our first sense of Willy’s estrangement not only from nature itself but from his own deepest nature. As Act I unfolds, the flute is linked to Willy’s father, who, we are told, made flutes and sold them during the family’s early wanderings. The father’s theme, â€Å"a high, rollic king tune,† is differentiated from the small and fine melody of the natural landscape (49). This distinction is fitting, for the father is a salesman as well as an explorer; he embodies the conflicting values that are destroying his son’s life. The father’s tune shares a family likeness with Ben’s â€Å"idyllic† (133) music. This false theme, like Ben himself, is associated finally with death. Ben’s theme is first sounded, after all, only after Willy expresses his exhaustion (44). It is heard again after Willy is fired in Act II. This time the music precedes Ben’s entrance. It is heard in the distance, then closer, just as Willy’s thoughts of suicide, once repressed, now come closer at the loss of his job. And Willy’s first words to Ben when he finally appears are the ambiguous â€Å"how did you do it?† (84). When Ben’s idyllic melody plays for the third and final time it is in â€Å"accents of dread† (133), for Ben reinforces Willy’s wrongheaded thought of suicide to bankroll Biff. The father’s and Ben’s themes, representing selling (out) and abandonment, are thus in opposition to the small and fine theme of nature that begins and ends the play. A whistling motif elaborates this essential conflict. Whistling is often done by those contentedly at work. It frequently also accompanies outdoor activities. A whistler in an office would be a distraction. Biff Loman likes to whistle, thus reinforcing his ties to nature rather than to the business environment. But Happy seeks to stifle Biff’s true voice: HAPPY . . . Bob Harrison said you were tops, and then you go and do some damn fool thing like whistling whole songs in the elevator like a comedian. BIFF, against Happy. So what? I like to whistle sometimes. HAPPY. You don t raise a guy to a responsible job who whistles in elevator! (60) This conversation reverberates ironically when Howard Wagner plays Willy a recording of his daughter whistling Roll out the Barrel† just before Willy asks for an advance and a New York job (77). Whistling, presumably, is all right if you are the boss or the boss’s daughter, but not if you are an employee. The barrel will not be rolled out for Willy or Biff Loman. Willy’s conflicting desires to work in sales and to do outdoor, independent work are complicated by another longing, that of sexual desire, which is expressed through the â€Å"raw, sensuous music† that accompanies The Woman’s appearances on stage (116, 37). It is this music of sexual desire, I suggest, that â€Å"insinuates itself† as the first leaves cover the house in Act 1.5 It is heard just before Willy – reliving a past conversation – offers this ironic warning to Biff: â€Å"Just wan na be careful with those girls, Biff, that’s all. Don’t make any promises. No promises of any kind† (27). This raw theme of sexual desire contrasts with Linda Loman’s theme: the maternal hum of a soft lullaby that becomes a â€Å"desperate but monotonous† hum at the end of Act I (69). Linda’s monotonous drone, in turn, contrasts with the â€Å"gay and bright† music, the boys’ theme, which opens Act II. This theme is associated with the â€Å"great times† (127) Willy remembers with his sons – before his adultery is discovered. Like the high, rollicking theme of Willy’s father and like Ben’s idyllic melody, this gay and bright music is ultimately associated with the false dream of materialistic success. The boys theme is first heard when Willy tells Ben that he and the boys will get rich in Brooklyn (87). It sounds again when Willy implores Ben, â€Å"[H]ow do we get back to all the great times?† (127). In his final moments of life, Willy Loman is shown struggling with his furies: â€Å"sounds, faces, voices, seem to be swarming in upon him† (136). Suddenly, however, the â€Å"faint and high† music enters, representing the false dreams of all the â€Å"low† men. This false tune ends Willy’s struggle with his competing voices. It drowns out the other voices, rising in intensity â€Å"almost to an unbearable scream† as Willy rushes off in pursuit. And just as the travail of Moby Dick ends with the ongoing flow of the waves, nature, in the form of the flute’s small and fine refrain, persists – despite the tragedy we have witnessed. Sets In the introduction to his Collected Plays, Miller acknowledges that the first image of Salesman that occurred to him was of an enormous face the height of the proscenium arch; the face would appear and then open up. â€Å"We would see the inside of a man’s head,† he explains. â€Å"In fact, The Inside of His Head was the first title. It was conceived half in laughter, (60) for the inside of his head was a mass of contradictions† (23). By the time Miller had completed Salesman, however, he had found a more subtle plays correlative for the giant head; a transparent setting. â€Å"The entire setting is wholly, or, in some places, partially transparent,† Miller insists in his set description (11). By substituting a transparent setting for a bisected head, Miller invited the audience to examine the social context as well as the individual organism. Productions that eschew transparent scenery eschew the nuances of this invitation. The transparent lines of the L oman home allow the audience physically to sense the city pressures that are destroying Willy. â€Å"We are aware of towering, angular shapes behind [Willy’s house], surrounding it on all sides. The roofline of the house is one-dimensional; under and over it we see the apartment buildings† (11-12). Wherever Willy Loman looks are these encroaching buildings, and wherever we look as well. Willy’s subjective vision is expressed also in the home’s furnishings, which are deliberately partial. The furnishings indicated are only those of importance to Willy Loman. That Willy’s kitchen has a table with three chairs instead of four reveals both Linda Loman’s unequal status in the family and Willy’s obsession with his boys. At the end of Act I, Willy goes to his small refrigerator for life-sustaining milk (cf. Brecht’s parallel use of milk in Galileo). Later, however, we learn that this repository of nourishment, like Willy himself, has broken down. That Willy Loman’s bedroom contains only a bed, a straight chair, and a shelf holding Biff’s silver athletic trophy also telegraphs much about the man and his family. Linda Loman has no object of her own in her bedroom. Willy Loman also travels light. He has nothing of substance to sustain him. His vanity is devoted to adolescent competition. Chairs ultimately become surrogates for people in Death of a Salesman as first a kitchen chair becomes Biff in Willy’s conflicted mind (28) and then an office chair becomes Willy’s deceased boss, Frank Wagner (82). In, perhaps, a subtle bow to Georg Kaiser’s Gas I and Gas II, Miller’s gas heater glows when Willy thinks of death. The scrim that veils the primping Woman and the screen hiding the restaurant where two women will be seduced suggest Willy Loman’s repression of sexuality. Lighting Expressionism has done more than any other movement to develop the expressive powers of stage lighting. The German expressionists used light to create a strong sense of mood and to isolate characters in a void. By contrasting light and shadow, and by employing extreme side, overhead, and rear lighting angles, they established the nightmarish atmosphere in which many of their plays took place. The original Kazan Salesman made use of more lights than were used even in Broadway musicals (Timebends 190). At the end of act 1, Biff comes downstage â€Å"into a golden pool of light† as Willy recalls the day of the city baseball championship when Biff was â€Å"[l]ike a young God. Hercules – something like that. And the sun, the sun all around him.† The pool of light both establishes the moment as one of Willy’s memories and suggests how he has inflated the past, given it mythic dimension. The lighting also functions to instill a sense of irony in the audience, fo r the golden light glows on undiminished as Willy exclaims, â€Å"A star like that, magnificent, can never really fade away!† We know that Biff’s star faded, even before it had a chance to shine, and even as Willy speaks these words, the light on him begins to fade (68). That Willy’s thoughts turn immediately from this golden vision of his son to his own suicide is indicated by the â€Å"blue flame† of the gas heater that begins immediately to glow through the wall – a foreshadowing of Willy’s desire to gild his son through his own demise. Productions that omit either the golden pool of light or the glowing gas heater withhold this foreshadowing of Willy’s final deed. Similarly, productions that omit the lights on the empty chairs miss the chance to reveal the potency of Willy’s fantasies. Perhaps even more important, the gas heater’s flame at the end of Act I recalls the â€Å"angry glow of orange† surrounding Willy’s house at the play’s beginning (11). Both join with the â€Å"red glow† rising from the hotel room and the restaurant to give a felt sense of Willy’s twice articulated cry: â€Å"The woods are burning!†¦There’s a big blaze going on all around† (41, 107). Without these sensory clues, audiences may fail to appreciate the desperation of Willy’s state. Characters and Costumes Miller employs expressionistic technique when he allows his characters to split into younger versions of themselves to represent Willy’s memories. Young Biff’s letter sweater and football signal his age reversion, yet they also move in the direction of social type. The Woman also is an expressionistic type, the play’s only generic character other than the marvelously individualized salesman. Miller’s greatest expressionistic creations, however, are Ben and Willy Loman. In his Paris Review interview, Miller acknowledged that he purposely refused to give Ben any character, â€Å"because for Willy he has no character – which is, psychologically, expressionist because so many memories come back with a simple tag on them: somebody represents a threat to you, or a promise† (Theater Essays 272). Clearly Ben represents a promise to Willy Loman. It is the promise of material success, but it is also the promise of death.6 We might consider Uncle Ben to be the ghost of Ben, for we learn that Ben has recently died in Africa. Since Miller never discloses the cause of Ben’s death, he may be a suicide himself. His idyllic melody, as I have noted, becomes finally a death march. In Willy’s last moments, the contrapuntal voices of Linda and Ben vie with each other, but Willy moves inexorably toward Ben. Alluding to Africa, and perhaps also to the River Styx, Ben looks at his watch and says, â€Å"The boat. We’ll be late† as he moves slowly into the darkness (135). Willy Loman, needless to say, is Miller’s brilliant demonstration that expressionistic techniques can express inner as well as outer forces, that expressionism can be used to create â€Å"felt,† humane character. The music, setting, and lighting of Salesman all function to express the world inside Willy Loman’s head, a world in which social and personal values meet and merge and struggle for integration. As Miller writes in the introduction to his Collected Plays: [The play’s] expressionistic elements were consciously used as such, but since the approach to Willy Loman’s characterization was consistently and rigorously subjective, the audience would not ever be aware – if I could help it – that they were witnessing the use of a technique which had until then created only coldness, objectivity, and a highly styled sort of play. (39) In 1983, when Miller arrived in Beijing to direct the first Chinese production of Death of a Salesman, he was pleased to find that the Chinese had created a mirror image of the original transparent set. Seeing this set, and observing that the kitchen was furnished with only a refrigerator, table, and two (not even three) chairs, Miller felt â€Å"a wonderful boost† to his morale (Salesman in Beijing 3-4). Teachers and directors might offer a similar boost by giving full weight to the expressionistic moments in Death of a Salesman. For directors, achieving such moments may be technically demanding, but they should not be abandoned simply because they are challenging.7 Similarly, the expressionistic devices should not be considered too obvious for postmodern taste. In truth, the expressionism in Salesman is not intrusive. Its very refinement of German expressionism lies in its subtlety, in its delicate balance with the realistic moments in the drama. This ever-shifting tension between realism and expressionism allows us to feel the interpenetration of outer and inner forces within the human psyche. The expressionistic devices also elevate Willy’s suffering, for they place it in the context of the natural order. To excise the expressionism is to diminish the rich chord that is Miller’s drama