Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
shocking to the audience and to Beatrice who later finds out from
Catherine.
What does Alfieri advise Eddie to do about preventing his niece from
marrying Rodolpho?
Answer: To let her go
Afieri tells him to 'Let her go and bless her'. It is Eddie's inability to do
this that results in the tragic ending of the play.
How long do Marco and Rodolpho stay at Eddie's house?
Answer: six months
Both brothers stay in New York for six months until they get captured
and taken to Alfieri by the Immigration Bureau Officers. Eddie betrays
them by calling the Immigration Officers right after he gets advice from
Alfieri about Catherine who tells him to 'put it out of your mind'. This
goes back on his word which he tells Beatrice at the beginning before
the cousins arrive: "It's an honour, B. I mean it".
Who is Rodolpho's brother?
Answer: Marco
They are both illegal Italian immigrants. Marco has come to get money
for his family back in Italy. Both men are Beatrice's cousins.
Eddie thinks Rodolfo is a 'punk' for several reasons, one of them being
that he can sing. What is the name of the song that Rodolfo sings on his
first night in Red Hook?
Answer: Paper Doll
Rodolfo also makes dresses, and Eddie believes that these qualities are
feminine and prove that Rodolfo is gay.
Who dies at the end of the play?
Answer: Eddie
Eddie tries to stab Marco but Marco twists the knife and thrusts it into
Eddie. Eddie dies in his wife's arms.
What does Catherine call Eddie on her wedding day when he forces
Beatrice not to go?
Answer: a rat
Beatrice is ready for Catherine and Rodolpho's wedding when Eddie
tells her not to go. Beatrice says that she is going for her sister and
Eddie tells her, "Now if that's more to you than I am, then go. But don't
come back". Catherine then enters the room in her wedding gown and
gets angry at Eddie. "How can you listen to him? This rat! He belongs in
the sewer! He bites people when they sleep! He comes when nobody's
lookin' and poisons decent people. In the garbage he belongs!"
Eddie finds it difficult to understand that there is nothing illegal about
Catherine marrying Rodolfo. What action does this lead him to take
against Rodolfo and his brother, Marco?
Answer: Turns them in to the Immigration Bureau
Eddie reports them and the Carbone apartment is searched. Marco and
Rodolfo are publicly arrested, and Eddie loses all the respect he had in
the Red Hook community as he has turned his back on one of their
beliefs.
What does Rodolpho want to buy when he earns enough money?
Answer: A motorbike
Rodolpho would like a motorbike. He plans to marry Catherine and
insists that they
stay in America after the two marry.
How does Eddie die?
Answer: he is stabbed during a struggle
Just when Marco calls Eddie an 'animal', Eddie gets out a knife and
aims at Marco. They both fight for the knife and Marco turns the blade
inward towards Eddie while it is in his hand and using pressure stabs
him. He dies in Beatrice's arms.
Catherine is smitten, and Eddie isn't happy. He doesn't want her ending up
with what he considers to be a man who acts like a blonde canary.
Long Questions
How does Arthur Miller present the ideas of manliness, hostility and aggression in Act One of A
View from the Bridge?
beholden to a code that binds him to violent action when crossed. This trait is,
however, latent in the first act of the play.
Eddie's hostility toward Rodolpho is demonstrated repeatedly in his
discussions with Beatrice and Catherine, as well as his discussions with
Alfieri. Though Eddie has agreed to house Beatrice's cousins, he is thoroughly
unable to be hospitable because of his jealous feelings for Catherine.
In A View from the Bridge, what are the themes that run through Eddie Carbone?
role and identity can be as unconscious as they are conscious, leading to out
of control behavior.
When deeply felt passions are in play and out of control, horrible things will
emerge.
This is not merely a case of masculinity gone awry. Eddie and Marco are
driven by the cultures they have internalized. The two men express a conflict
that is much larger than two individuals.
Discuss the function of Alfieri in A View from the Bridge.
After Eddie, Alfieriis the most important character in the play. His role is similar
to that of the chorus of the Greek tragedies as he narrates, comments, and
sometimes participates in the play. Although he is wise but he was unable to
prevent Eddie's Betrayal to his family. He had said so,"being an intelligent
man, he was so powerless to stop the tragedy". He is the first who opens the
play by discussing how law is important in America. In Italy, there was no law
to protect them therefore they took their revenge with there own hands.
Alfiere is a good lawyer as well as a rational judge of people. And
professionaly detached himself (Emotionally as his family had advised him),
and views situations from the bridge. He advises Eddie many times to settle
for half and let Catherine go, all Eddie can do is "bless her".
He gives details on time, date, and place thus filling gaps between scenes. He
skillfully weaves his opinions while throwing in a description on characters. It
is obvious that he knows Eddie from before as he "presented his father in an
accident case some years before" thus having some acquaintance with the
family.
Alfieri is the voice of reason as he warned Eddie that he better settle for half
or he wouldn't have a friend in the world. He is Arthur Millers Mouthpiece
therfore he makes us understand, Condemn, Admire and Forgive Eddie on
what he had put himself into due to his oversexuality that he had no control
over
How does Arthur Miller create tragedy in A View From the Bridge?
One of the ways in which Miller creates tragedy in this play is through the
conflict between the self and the community. Throughout the play, Miller
makes it clear that there is a difference of will that is occurring: the will of
Eddie Carbone and his own individual desires and then the will of the
community, that requires its members to act in a certain way to sustain the
interests of that community, and sharply censures anyone who does not act in
this way. Tragedy is created through Eddie's actions in disregarding the
community and pursuing his own desires in conflict with the interests of the
community. Note how Alfieri reflects on Eddie's tragedy at the end of the play:
Most of the time we settle for half and I like it better. Even as I know how
wrong he was, and his death useless, I tremble, for I confess that something
perversely pure calls to me from his memorynot purely good, but himself
purely And yet, it is better to settle for half, it must be! And so I mourn himI
admit itwith a certain alarm.
What is interesting about this quote is the way that Alfieri refers to the tragedy
of Eddie as something that both challenges and inspires him. Alfieri
recognises that there has to be give and take in this conflict between the
individual and the community, and that this "half" is the best thing to settle for.
Yet, what Eddie did was to be himself and be "perversely pure," which ended
in his death because of the way he defied the community. Even though Alfieri
thinks this is dangerous, the oxymoron in "perversely pure" shows the
attraction he finds in Eddie's example, in refusing to let oneself be inhibited by
the needs of the community. The tragedy is thus created in this play through
this conflict between the individual and the community and what happens
when one man acts for his own goals against the community.
What reaction might 'ordinary humans' with little knowledge of the immigrant communities have
towards A View from the Bridge?
There are many elements of this play unrelated to immigration. In fact, the
central drama is not directly related to the circumstances of Marco and
Rodolpho as illegal immigrants.
Rather, the central conflict of the play and its dramatic impact is drawn from
Eddie Carbone, his jealous and innappropriate feelings for his neice, and his
Eddie Carbone's complexity grows out of his lack of ability to see himself
clearly. Eddie has developed a romantic love for his niece.
What are the literary devices used in A View from the Bridge?
A number of literary devices are employed by Miller in this play. The first and
most obvious literary device of the play is the use of a frame story.
The lawyer, Alfieri, opens the story with a monologue (this is another
repeatedly used literary device from the play. In a poetic speech, Alfieri
introduces the themes of the play, including the background themes and the
foreground themes.
In the background of this play stands a notion of the Old World meeting the
new. To some extent, the conflicts and tensions of the play grow out of this
meeting of two worlds (we might even say "collision" of two worlds).
Alfieri opens and closes the play with the same poetic refrain, repeating
certain phrases and reiterating directly the idea that this play is not only about
interpersonal conflict but also about a conflict of ages, so to speak.
These monologues function as a frame story, as Alfieri introduces the
protagonist in the opening monologue and makes a final comment in the
closing coda.
Alfieri serves as spokesperson for all as he delivers the final monologue,
bringing the tragic tale to a close.
Additionally, Alfieri functions as the chorus in this play, hearkening back to
Greek tradition.
Alfieri's repeated narration of events helps to control the way time passes in
the play, separating periods of time with his monologues. Functionally, these
narrative monologues replace scene breaks that would otherwise be used.
How does the audience' view of Eddie Carbone change from the beginning to the end of A View
from the Bridge?