A View from the Bridge

In ancient Greece, dramas were written in one of two formats; comedies or

tragedies. ‘A View from the Bridge’, written by Auther Miller, is a drama that iss
structured like an ancient Greek tragedy to emphasise its universal nature.
These tragedies tend to have a strong protagonist with one self destructive flaw
which leads to their inevitable downfall. In this case, it is Eddie Carbone, whose
single flaw is his unethical obsession for Catherine through which he defies the
laws of his own people. In each tragedy, it is also common for there to be a
chorus commenting on the action which in this case is provided by Alfieri.

The drama revolves around Eddie. He is the focal point and everything rests on
Eddie’s reaction to events. With the nature of a traditional Italian man, Eddie had
adopted the traditions of his culture despite living in America. Similarly to every
other traditional Italian man, he has a typical orthodox mentality which believed
very much in the distinctively separate roles of men and women. This is reflected
in the fact that Eddie is the breadwinner of the family and works hard as a
Longshoremen everyday on the docks of New York, and he expects his wife
Beatrice to manage the home and provide a well-cooked meal for him when he
returns home after a long day’s work.

Eddie also has a strong sense of honour which was maintained through the first
scene of the drama, not only within his own family but also among the whole
community and his good reputation meant everything to him. With generosity
and a family orientated personality combined together, Eddie believes in helping
people and so, when Beatrice asks him to allow her cousins to find shelter in
their home, Eddie feels compelled to do so without thinking of the future
consequences of his decision. Characterised as a strong personality, part of
Eddie’s character remains uncivilised who believes more in his own traditional
laws rather than the law in America. Described by Alfieri as not ‘settled for half’,
Eddie’s character is further portrayed with an element of stubbornness to it
which evidently is a statement of the fact that he was used to having his way.

It is noticeable that Eddie is at odds with nearly every other character. His
relationship towards Catherine and Beatrice indicated developing tensions which
were to be followed by more significant problems that were yet to come. With
Catherine, Eddie acts like an over-protective lover rather than an over-protective
father figure which would justify his comments about Catherine’s dressing sense
as well as his concern for her meeting the outer world. Instead, Eddie mentions
to Catherine that her dress is too short and that she’s ‘walking wavy’ in the
anticipation that she would take his comments into consideration and therefore
stop doing what Eddie didn’t want her to. Masking his insecurity, when Catherine
greets other men, Eddie uses the excuse that she is naive and is unaware of the
evils of people in the outer world as a method of preventing her from meeting
other men. Even when Catherine asks to take up a job, Eddie feels concerned
and pressured by her decisions. He tells her that she should finish school
although it is obvious that really he feels as though he would lose her forever if
she stepped into the real world as she would meet new people, more
importantly, other men. This would mean that his life’s efforts of keeping
Catherine deprived from the rest of the world would fail. He is worried that once
she becomes more independent, going out to work and earning her own money,
she will want to leave home. Eddie seems to be the sort of person who ‘needs to
be needed’ and that’s why he doesn’t want her to leave.

There is also hostility between Eddie and Beatrice which leads to further
tensions. Eddie’s love for Catherine had become sexual, even though he refused
to admit it and it is this very love that is the cause of friction in his own marriage.
Beatrice feels like a neglected housewife who is desperate for her husband’s
attention. What makes it worse is that he takes no notice of her and is instead,
further drawn towards Catherine. Fully aware of Eddie’s feelings towards
Catherine, Beatrice feels as though the only way of regaining her husband’s love
would be through removing Catherine from the house. Even though Catherine
was so close to her, Beatrice had to find ways of guiding her out of the house
and into the real world where she could set up her own life. This is why Beatrice
encourages Catherine to stand up for herself at every given occasion. She
explains to Catherine that she cannot let Eddie treat her like a baby and that she
must become more independent, grown up and less intimate with Eddie in the
house. Supporting Catherine’s decision of starting to take up a job and
encouraging her relationship with Rodolpho, Beatrice even rebels against
‘Eddie’s Law’ which she hadn’t ever done before.

Tensions develop further when Eddie’s worst nightmare becomes reality and he
is no longer the only man in Catherine’s life. Beatrice’s cousins Marco and
Rodolpho arrive in Brooklyn. Rodolpho enters the tragedy as a catalyst, making
the feelings Eddie had for Catherine more predominant. Eddie had spent his
whole life shielding Catherine from men and now he is no longer the only man in
her life because he is compelled to let Beatrice’s cousins live under his own roof.
Over the course of time, Catherine and Rodolpho fall in love, and Eddie,
jealoused of Catherine’s undivided attention towards Rodolpho, starts making
fake accusations to Beatrice and Catherine upon Rodolpho’s character. He claims
that Rodolpho ‘aint right’ (implying that Rodolpho’s homosexual) and is simply
with Catherine to attain American citizenship and is ‘after his passport’. When
nothing comes of his allegations, Eddie appeals to American Law (Alfieri) to help
his obsessive feelings towards Catherine. However, frustrated by lack of support
and agreement by Alfieri, Eddie feels turned down by his last resort of help.
Alfieri explains to Eddie that there is nothing the law can do to stop Rodolpho
and Catherine being together however, Eddie cannot comprehend this fact and
doesn’t accept that the law can’t do anything even if ‘Rodolpho’s a punk’. It is
the frustration Eddie feels at the end of this unproductive conversation along
with the course of events so far that leads to the tensions in the final scene of
Act 1.

We shift our focus to the final scene of Act 1 because it is here that Eddie’s
feelings for Catherine become apparent to Marco as well as Rodolpho, and with
those feelings, grows tensions which lead to Eddie’s inevitable death. It is in this
scene where the built up tension finally culminates, and it is evident that drastic
measures would be the only result of all that takes place in this scene.

There is a feeling of potential conflict in the air when we see Eddie, Beatrice,
Catherine, Marco and Rodolpho at home together during a genuine discussion on
the surface, which in fact, underneath was rather like passing subtle messages
to one another. The arrangement of the characters at the start of the scene
distinctively illustrates their feelings. For example, Catherine and Rodolpho sit
next to each other which shows that Catherine is no longer afraid to express her
love for Rodolpho in front of Eddie. Also, Eddie is sat to the side, excluded and no
longer the centre of attention. With a feeling of losing his sense of ‘honour’ in the
house, he makes barbed comments, implying that Rodolpho is too friendly with
Catherine and too casual with his money. The act sums up with a fight between
Eddie and Rodolpho where Catherine makes it clear that she loves Rodolpho
more than Eddie.

Further into the scene, we come across key dramatic points through irrational
conflict. Throughout the scene, Eddie is seen holding a newspaper, which he first
uses to cover his face while darting unpleasant comments out at Rodolpho and
Marco and then using it as a barrier to resist himself from causing damage and
ending up in a fight. While Catherine and Rodolpho are sat next to each other
and the talk is focused on the glamorous lives of the brothers, both Beatrice and
Catherine are excited and intrigued by the talk as the brothers represented the
world outside their own sheltered lives.

According to his own interpretation of the situation, Eddie feels as though he is

made to look small and seemingly like he hasn’t fulfilled his duty of looking after
the women of the house well enough as they’ve never known anything of life
outside the Carbone household. In retaliation, Eddie tries to sound
knowledgeable, in hope that the spot light would be on him once more. However,
he fails. From the beginning of the passage, when Eddie claims he ‘heard that
they paint oranges to make them look orange’, Marco responds: ‘No, in Italy the
oranges are orange’. By modifying the sentence with the words ‘In Italy’, Marco
is modestly implying that Eddie could be right-that oranges could be painted-in
other countries, just not Italy. This is why Eddie doesn’t resent being instructed
by Marco whereas when corrected by Rodolpho, he bites back with rage in the
attempt to stop himself from looking foolish. Eddie reacts violently as he feels
the need to be dominant in his own home as well as the fact that he resented
being corrected by someone he had no respect for and thought of as a
homosexual, therefore not a real man.

Such an attack could obviously lead to conflict, but the other characters quickly
change the subject. Beatrice, being the calming influence, diverts their attention
by changing the subject to Marco’s family in Italy. However this fails, and due to
Eddie’s emotional turmoil, he doesn’t always realise (or care) when he is being
inappropriate. The strong feelings Eddie possesses for Catherine, make him
helpless and so he cannot control the abrupt insults he hurls at Marco even
though he has no hard feeling against him. For example, he scorns the women of
Italy, thus indirectly scorning Marco’s wife which was deeply insulting, bearing in
mind that Italian men had a strong sense of family, particularly Marco. Eddie’s
intention is not to cause an argument and so he conceals his insulting comment
with laughter, in attempt to make it sound like a joke.

The fact that he makes the other characters feel uncomfortable coupled with his
apparent lack of forethought also leads one to conclude that his behaviour is
impolite. In this case, Eddie does not care that he is being offensive by indirectly
suggesting that Marco’s wife could be unfaithful. Even though Marco’s character
is like Eddie’s, he cannot react here as he is dependent upon the security of
Eddie. However, Rodolpho does react, defending Marco’s honour. By this time
Rodolpho’s respect for Eddie had started deteriorating while Eddie’s feelings
were becoming more obvious. Eddie preaches to Rodolpho that ‘it aint so free’ in
Brooklyn as he thinks, but then when Rodolpho asks unequivocally, ‘I do
anything wrong’, he backs off saying, ‘I’m only her uncle-’. This is because Eddie
knows he has no reason for disliking Rodolpho, nor for thinking he is not treating
Catherine with respect. While Rodolpho speaks defensively, Eddie ignores and
continues talking to Marco only as if he were making a statement that Rodolpho
wasn’t ‘fit’ to talk to Eddie as Eddie only spoke to real men and not weak
homosexuals. Although fully aware of Eddie’s delegations, Marco had to
reprimand Rodolpho, treating him like a boy.

Later in the scene, a significant moment comes when Catherine, for the first
time, openly rebels against Eddie and asks Rodolpho to dance. It is as if
Catherine was signalling for Eddie to put a stop to his inappropriate comments.
Rodolpho refuses to dance as he fears Eddie’s reaction although after noticing
the shock on Eddie’s face, Beatrice encourages the two to dance, turning against
Eddie as though it were a way of making Eddie comprehend that he would have
to get used to seeing Catherine and Rodolpho together. Rodolpho stands up and
dances with Catherine to Paper Doll (ironically used), symbolically taking her
from Eddie who sits frozen, by this point, insanely jealoused of Rodolpho. The
tension locked up within Eddie is on the verge of boiling over as he watches the
couple holding each other in deep love.

Eddie’s bitter response in three times to repeat the formula: ‘He sings, he cooks,
he could make dresses...I can’t cook, I can’t sing, I can’t make dresses, so I’m on
the waterfront. But if I could cook, if I could sing, if I could make dresses, I
wouldn’t be on the waterfront. Here Eddie remains persistent in accusation and
pretends to admire the fact that Rodolpho can cook, sew and sing, before adding
that it is wrong for someone who possesses those skills to work at the docks. The
stage direction tells that Eddie has been ‘unconsciously twisting the newspaper’
as he makes gross insults, attacking Rodolpho’s manliness by stating that he
isn’t manly enough to work on the waterfront. As he twists the newspaper, Eddie
releases all his anger, and then finally, when he can’t resist it within himself any
longer, he tears the paper. This symbolises that the barrier had been torn down,
all limits had been crossed and now Eddie’s obsession had been exposed in front
of everyone.
Realising that he’d exceeded his limits and gone too far, Eddie pretends to
lighten the mood. He offers to treat Rodolpho and Marco to a night watching a
prize-fight and teaches Rodolpho to box. This was evidently just an excuse to
punch Rodolpho, but Rodolpho takes it good humouredly. After allowing him to
land some blows, Eddie strikes him harder: ‘It mildly staggers Rodolpho’. He
purposely hits Rodolpho when Catherine returns from the kitchen after having
made the coffee. The three onlookers all see what Eddie is trying to do, but his
attempt to make Catherine think less of Rodolpho had failed. In fact, instead of
being anywhere close to impressed by Eddie’s ‘manly superiority’ (as he’d like to
call it), Catherine shows that she is more interested in Rodolpho’s safety than
Eddie’s and goes to Rodolpho’s aid.

By this time, Rodolpho was fully aware of what was going on similarly like the
other characters. Eddie’s actions not only exhibit Rodolpho’s deteriorating
respect for Eddie but also show Eddie’s weakening control over his subsequence
actions. Without acting violently, Rodolpho takes Catherine by the hand and
retaliates by dancing with her. It was as though Rodolpho and Eddie were both
competing to to have Catherine and Rodolpho had just made a statement by
dancing with her, showing that he’d won. What made his defeat worse was the
fact that Eddie had to sit there, bearing the pain of watching Catherine and
Rodolpho together hand in hand.

The final movement in this scene comes from Marco, insinuating the
consequences of Eddie’s predicted actions. Marco rises when Rodolpho is hit
however, instead of bursting out in rage, which he was quite capable of doing, he
contains himself. He clearly believes actions speak louder than words, whether in
loading a ship or threatening Eddie and so instead, he shows Eddie a preview of
his own strength by lifting a chair by its leg with one hand-a feat that Eddie
cannot match. Once more, the other characters watch the action attentively as
the trial of strength shows Marco’s dominance over Eddie without violence and
expulsion.

Finally, at the end of Act 1, as Alfieri tells us in the chorus, we can now see the
inevitability of this tragedy. Rodolpho and Catherine are further drawn together,
bonded against Eddie and his masked jealousy. The anger locked up in Eddie is
now about to boil over as he was on the verge of betraying not only Marco and
Rodolpho but also betraying the core values of the Italian community in Red
Hook; all this due merely due to the uncontrollable lust Eddie possessed for
Catherine. When all other means of eliminating Rodolpho from Catherine’s life
failed, he felt as though his only option remaining was to report Rodolpho to the
Immigration. Even after Alfieri’s warning, Eddie wasn’t going to settle for half and
he would get what he wanted by hook or by crook, no matter if this meant that
he’d cause Marco to suffer as well. With this final act of treachery, it becomes
slowly apparent to the audience that his downfall is inevitable. Marco’s sense of
honour will force him to take revenge on Eddie, and the fact that the former is
also far superior in terms of strength; one can only foresee a grim end for the
protagonist.