\u201cFunny, you know? After all the highways, and the trains, and the appointments, and the years, you end up worth more dead than alive,\u201d says Willie Loman when he has finally been burnt out by his life\u2019s pursuit of the quixotic American dream. Death of A Salesman debuted on Broadway in February 1949. Afterwards, US society could never quite escape the rancid aftertaste of a message that the system would ultimately chew them up.<\/p>\n
A collective belief in the importance and rewards of hard work is the engine that drives American society. It\u2019s one of the messages the White House constantly imparts about the 47th president: that Donald Trump<\/a> is \u201calways working\u201d; that he is working \u201c24\/7 to deliver for the American people\u201d. <\/p>\n In a country of 350 million people, the competition to become the best at anything is overwhelming, so it\u2019s little surprise that contemporary gods of sport or business will habitually reflect on the countless hours they dedicated to their craft. <\/p>\n Elon Musk<\/a>\u2019s lifetime of hard work recently earned him the title of the world\u2019s first trillion-dollar company man \u2013 no mean feat. Musk, too, likes to advertise himself as a positive role model for dedication to the job.<\/p>\n \u201cYou need to work super-hard\u201d he said at a commencement speech at the University of Southern California a decade ago.<\/p>\n \u201cIf somebody else is working 50 hours [a week] and you\u2019re working 100, you\u2019ll get twice as much done in the course of a year as the other company,\u201d he said, pointing out that it is just \u201csimple math\u201d. It really is! <\/p>\n The late Kobe Bryant used to advocate that same ethic as he became the post-Jordan basketball lodestone, rising absurdly early for a 4.30am shooting session that he knew nobody else in the league would wake for.<\/p>\n