
Immortality is the opposite of immortality.
Immortality mean you don’t die…ever. I think
in D.O.A.S that immortality means that you
might die in body but you will be remembered
by a lot of people due to the fact that you left
your mark or a legacy back on earth. Willy
Loman is afraid of being mortal this would
ironically lead to his death.

Willy tried to leave his mark on the world by
planting seeds in his back yard. His pathetic
attempt to leave his mark shows how desperate
and afraid that if he died nobody will have
anything to remember him by. The seeds are a
symbol of his paranoia of being forgotten and
also of being one of the few accomplishment in
his life that is tangible (can be touched).

Willy idolizes people who according to him
have joined the ranks of the great. Dave
Singleman whom he speaks of with great
admiration when talking to Howard Wagner
about his job on pg 36 is one of Willy’s two
obvious Idols in D.O.A.S. he (according to
Willy) was remembered by all the buyers and
salesmen that he has ever met. This in his eyes
makes him immortal as everyone missed and
remembered him.

Ben is the deceased brother of Willy. He mysteriously made a lot
of money extremely quickly. He is the second obvious idol of
Willy Loman in the play D.O.A.S. Even though Ben was dead
Willy at times of extreme stress or having to deal with problems
has hallucinations of Ben , this imaginary Ben would remind him
that he is a failure in life and should have com with him to Alaska.
Throughout the play when Willy would ask him what was the
secret of success Ben would reply with the mysterious answer:
“When I was seventeen, I walked into the jungle. And when I was
twenty-one, I walked out. And by God, I was rich.” This made
him immortal in the eyes of Willy due to his mysterious answers
and the fact that he had made a lot of money and had a lot of
success he had never kept books.