In the drama, Death of a Salesman, Arthur Miller does a very thorough job of creating and developing his characters. Harold Loman, son of the salesman Willy Loman, is given the ironic nickname “Happy.” This title actually exists as a misnomer because Happy is only cheerful on the surface.  Throughout the play, proof and origins of Happy’s discontent become visible. Also during the story, it becomes evident the Happy is actually a younger version of Willy Loman and has acquired the negative traits of Willy.

Happy’s first sign of dissatisfaction is seen at the beginning of Act One. Biff sees Happy as a success, but Happy admits otherwise. Happy confesses that he has everything he has ever wanted, yet is still unhappy; “…But then, it’s what I always wanted. My own apartment, a car, and plenty of women. And still…, I’m lonely.” When Happy speaks of “plenty of women”, this brings up the first negative trait comparable to Willy. Both Happy’s life and Willy’s younger self in the story revolve around sexual situations. Willy has constantly tried to forget his affair with The Woman in Boston, while Happy’s life is always moving around his current pursuit of a woman.

Arthur Miller also uses irony with the character Happy. Happy is a reincarnation of a part of Willy, yet has no intimate connection with his father. In Willy’s first visual flashback, Happy exclaims several times that he had lost weight and Willy ignored him. This sad relationship continues into present time and is seen again when Happy and Biff treat Willy to a big dinner. Willy ends up going into a flashback and instead of caring for his father, Happy, leaves with two prostitutes while leaving Willy to fend for himself in the restaurant washroom.

When Happy and Biff return home that night, another of Happy’s unflattering traits appears. Throughout his life, Happy has always exaggerated the status of the women he has been with and heightened the appearance of his job. Happy has never been truthful and has always been caught in this self-delusion. Happy gains this characteristic from his father Willy, as Willy would always tell his family that he was known in every city he traveled to and was waited on hand and foot. Willy believed that he was the top salesman in his firm at one point, which parallels to Happy believing that he was the assistant buyer at a previous job. In reality, Happy was only one of the two assistants to the assistant buyer just as his father was always one of the worst salesmen.

Throughout the play, Happy remains static and develops no depth to his personality at all. From the beginning, Happy and his father, whom Happy was based on, share no emotional connection at all. Happy has always been in the background of his family and left out, thus driving Happy to acquire “love” from mistresses that he picks up nightly. And with Happy’s delusional views about himself and his status, he seems to be doomed to staying in the shadows when it comes to the real world.