According to the article, Understanding Mental Illness, mental illness comes in many forms, just like physical illnesses. Mental illness is very common; one out of every five Canadians will have some kind of mental illness at some point in their life. The good news is that most mental illnesses or psychiatric disorders have treatment.
As I read the two books, Death of Sales Man and Catcher in the Rye, I have noticed that there is similarity between the main characters. Holden and Willy seem to both have some kind mental health problem. They are both delusional, and both have some sort of phobia of mistrust.
Holden's unstable mental state is caused most likely by the death of Allie Caulfield. The loss of his brother and everything else happening in his life has made Holden depressed, delusional and suicidal. Holden mistrusts everyone around him, except his younger sister Phoebe. He considers everyone a "phony"; a fake.
Willy Loman from Death of a Salesman, is displayed as mentally unstable. He struggles with himself in his thoughts throughout the play. He believes that he's running out of money, and he cannot pay for his appliances, and then he imagines his nameless mistress and etc. Like Holden, Willy Loman also has dependency problems. He cannot trust his own son Biff, and we observe that he feels betrayed by him.
Internet sources:
http://www.cmha.ca/bins/content_page.asp?cid=3
Newspaper source:
http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2005-06-06-mental-usat_x.htm
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