Eddie in A View From the Bridge by Arthur Miller

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Eddie in A View From the Bridge by Arthur Miller "A View from the Bridge," is a play by Arthur Miller. The scene is down town New York along the fore shore and involves Eddie Carbone, an Italian Longshoreman, his wife Beatrice and her niece Catherine. When his wife's cousins, Marco and Rodolfo, seek refuge as illegal immigrants from Sicily, Eddie agrees to shelter them. Trouble begins, as his wife's niece Catherine, is attracted to Rodolfo. Eddie's baffled jealousy culminates in an unforgivable crime against his family and the Sicilian community. It is Eddie Carbone, who is identified by Alfieri as the hero of this particular tragedy, however the hero has a character fault, this draws him inevitably to tragedy. There are many different sides to Eddie's personality; he has good, bad, admirable as well as hateful qualities. During this play, we see these different sides of him through the way he interacts with his family. Eddie is a fundamentally simple, straightforward man who worked on the piers when there was work, he is seen to be humorous, kind and generous in anticipating the arrival, illegally, of his wife's cousins. Eddie is a family man and a very loving person. His kind nature is shown when he acts as a father figure towards Catherine; "Well, tell me what happened. Come over here, talk to me." This shows he has an interest in her problems, he uses a very comforting manner. Eddie is a family man and agrees straight away to help illegal immigrants. He works hard and has a good job. These good points help us to forgive him more for his bad points however there are quite a lot of them. He is over protective of his niece, Catherine, in her increasing maturity. "I don't like the looks they are giving you in the candy store" "You're a baby" It is I believe this urge to protect Catherine, which makes him try to keep her from discovering independence. Catherine rapidly becomes attracted toward Rodolfo; this makes Eddie increasingly sensitive to

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