"Extra discipline makes up for a lack of talent and a lack of discipline quickly siphons away extra talent, that's why it's frequently the most disciplined rather than the most gifted rise to the top."
When nothing seems to help, I go look at a stonecutter hammering away at his rock perhaps a hundred times without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred and first blow it will spit in two, and I know it was not that blow that did it, but all that had gone before.
Willy: Then hang yourself! For spite, hang yourself!
Biff: No! Nobody's hanging himself, Willy! I ran down eleven flights with a pen in my hand today. And suddenly I stopped, youe hear me? And in the middle of that office building, do you hear this? I stopped in the middle of that building and I saw -- the sky. I saw the things that I love in this world. The work and the food and the time to sit and smoke. And I looked at the pen and said tp myself, what the hell am I grabbing this for?Why am I trying to become what I don't want to be? What am I doing in an office, making a contemptuous, begging fool of myself, when all I want is out there, waiting for me the minute I say I know who I am!Why can't I say that , Willy? He tries to make Willy face him, but Willy pulls away and moves to the left.
Willy, with hatred, threateningly: The door of your life is wide open!
Biff: Pop!I'm a dime a dozen, and so are you!
Willy, turning on him now in an uncontrolled outburst: I am not a dime a dozen! I am Willy Loman, and you are Biff Loman! Biff starts for Willy, but is blocked by Happy. In his fury, Biff seems on the verge of attacking his father.
Biff: I am not a leader of men, Willy, and neither are you. You were never anything but a hard-working drummer who landed in the ash can like all the rest of them! I'm one dollar an hour, Willy! I tried seven states and couldn't raise it. A buck an hour! Do you gather my meaning? I'm not bringing home any prizes any more, and you're going to stop waiting for me to bring them home!
Willy. directly to Biff: You vengeful, spiteful mut! Biff breaks from Happy.Willy, in fright, startsup the stairs. Biff graps him. Biff, at the peak of his fury:Pop, I'm nothing! I'm nothing, Pop. Can't you understander that?There's no spite in it any more. I'm just what I am, that's all. Biff's fury has spent itself, and he breaks down, sobbing, holding on to Willy, who dumbly fumbles for Biff's face. Willy, astonished: What're you doing?What're you doing? To Linda: Why is he crying?
Biff, crying, broken:Will you let me go, for Christ's sake? Will you take that phony dream and burn it before something happens?
