Alienation Actualized in the Form of Mental Health Disorders within Miller’s Willy Loman and Woolf’s Septimus Warren Smith: A Comparative Modernist Reading of Death of a Salesman and Mrs. Dalloway

Abstract

This study aimed to illustrate how the two modernist authors, namely Arthur Miller and Virginia Woolf within their two widely celebrated literary productions titled Death of a Salesman and Mrs. Dalloway respectively, exhibited modern men as dismal and disconnected by illustrating how they actualize their deep sense of alienation in the form of several mental health disorders. It followed the unstructured mode of inquiry that is the Qualitative approach of research. The style used to design this paper is exploratory and descriptive. The findings of the paper revealed how by portraying the mental health disorders of modern men, for instance, Paranoia, PTSD, Shell Shock, Bipolar Disorder, Megalomaniacal Hallucinations, metaphorical Schizophrenia etc. as the results of their alienated condition, Miller and Woolf actually criticized the very reasons behind the alienation of modern men, that happen to be the Repressive Ideologies associated with Materialism and society’s negative outlook towards the aforementioned mental health issues. Lastly, this particular paper is helpful for academicians willing to gather more knowledge about the exhibition of alienation by 20th century American and European writers within their modernist literatures in the shape of notable mental health disorders.