Analyze the character of Joe. (The book A Time of Your Life by William Saroyan - Essay Example

Staged in 1939, the play takes place in ‘Nick’s’ which has been described as an American place and a San Francisco water-front honky-tonk and the central character has vital features altogether. “The central character is Joe, an independently wealthy ne’er-do-well who, like Squier in his aimlessness, spends his money freely and treating everyone unlucky to drink or cash.” (Krasner, 19) Therefore, the character of Joe in this celebrated play is an important topic of analysis and discussion and this paper undertakes to analyze what makes him behave and speak as he does, how his interactions with other characters reveal his character, what are his chief limitations and, finally, how the character of Joe lives up to or fails to match Saroyan’s opening declaration.

In a close understanding of the major character in the play, it becomes lucid that Joe has been an important character revealing the major themes of the play and he lives up to the designs of Saroyan in the play, although there are views suggesting that none of the characters is completed developed to represent all the aspects of the playwright’s points. The character of Joe in the play The Time of Your Life by William Saroyan has been an important agent carrying the plot as well as the representation of the major themes forward and through this character the playwright suggests his major arguments.

For example, it is through character of Joe that the playwright develops his major theme of success in the play, and he not only tells about this theme but shows it through the character. “Saroyan’s descriptions and the actions of the characters are very telling and indicate that the author is interested in what makes someone a good or happy person beyond what is generally considered financial and social success in America. Joe, for example, has made such a large amount of money that he can afford to sit at Nick’s without a job,