Alfieri certainly builds tension in the audience. He creates a sense of foreboding through his language and suggests that something might happen. He shows this by saying, for example, “This was the first time they had been alone together in the house” this shows that Rodolpho and Catherine alone together could mean that something was going to happen, maybe they were going to declare their love for each other. The audience is then expecting something exciting or horrifying to happen. They can feel the tension building. The audience can tell when there will be a new twist added to the story every time Alfieri starts a speech.
Alfieri plays a dramatic role, warning the audience of upcoming events. His speeches are very significant as he uses quite foreboding language such as “watched it run its bloody course”, he says this in his opening speech and he is saying that he knows what is going to happen and he is powerless to stop it from taking place. Alfieri can also be perceived as a commentator, by commenting on the play and the characters “Eddie Carbone had never expected to have a destiny”. He comments on Eddie the most, as he is the main character of the play. He describes his thoughts and feelings about him “I will love him more than all my sensible clients”.
Alfieri’s character also helps to bring out Eddie’s own thought and emotions by being the only person in the play in whom Eddie confides “I’m tryin’ to bring out my thoughts here”. Eddie can tell Alfieri things because he knows that Alfieri has better education and can help. “My father always said you was a smart man”. Alfieri upholds the law but knows what justice means to people like Eddie so can understand him better. “Well they entered illegally” Alfieri says this because he knows not to betray them because of his own experiences with justice.
In this play, Alfieri is telling the story as if he has already witnessed it. He brings up themes such as justice and law, justice meaning what other people saw was. It is not the law or the right action to do. The law is the written set of rules used in the nation and is what you are meant to do but not what is just or fair.
Law and justice play very important parts in this play. However, they mean very different things. In “A View from the Bridge” the law of America and justice to the people of Brooklyn mean very different things. This is because a large percentage of the population are immigrants from Italy and some of them illegal. “They been pullin’ this since the immigration law was put in”. This means that the community in Brooklyn is like a large family. Therefore there is a very strong community law where the immigrants live which defines the people’s respect for one another. To the people of Brooklyn, their community law is justice.
These community laws go back to the ancient traditions of from when they lived in Italy. They were that if someone wronged you, then you had to go deal with that person and if you didn’t take care of it, then your family would and this argument between the families would go on for generations and generations, but if you just let it go and you forgave that person then you would not be considered honourable and you would have lost your honour as a man.
The most important of these ‘laws’ is that nobody should reveal the information of illegal immigrants entering the area, as the immigrants are most likely somebody’s relatives. It also means that the people who have been hiding the immigrants are in danger from immigration officers. A good example of what happened to somebody who reported illegal immigrants is when Vinny Bolzano reports his uncle to the officers “pulled him down the stairs- three flights…they spit on him on the street” Spitting on a relative in the street shows how disgusted the family were with Vinny, as the rest of the neighbourhood would have been watching, so they could let everyone know how they felt. It then goes on to say “The whole neighbourhood was cryin’”. This shows how the whole of the neighbourhood felt sorry for the family, and felt the same way, because of the strong community law.
Alfieri plays a strong part in the law America. This is because he is a lawyer, so he can tell the community what they can and cannot do. However, the community of Brooklyn think of lawyers as unlucky “to meet a lawyer… on the street is unlucky”. This shows how the community are not happy with the idea of the law America, which links to the reason behind their community law. Alfieri states, “If he obeys the law he lives”. This shows how Alfieri has all of the answers about the law, and the lawful things that people should do. However, not everybody follows his advice. After Alfieri has delivered this line to Marco, he still goes against Alfieri’s word and kills Eddie. This shows how strong the community law is around Brooklyn, as Marco wants to get revenge.
There is a link between the two countries of America and Sicily in the play. Marco says “In my country he would be dead by now” as the community law in his home country would have been the same as in Brooklyn, and Marco would have killed Eddie by now. This also shows how much Marco wants to get revenge on Eddie, as he is making excuses to kill him.
Alfieri describes a lot of justice in his opening speech. One of the examples he uses is when talking about gangsters in the area, who were unlawful. He describes them shooting people as just: “Justly shot by unjust men”. This shows how although he practises the law, he thinks that these people shooting others was just. This clearly shows how even a lawyer knows that law and justice are not always the same. He says that it was just to shoot the men, and that the men were unjust, and so deserved to be shot by other men who were breaking the law to shoot them. He then goes on to say that “Justice is very important here”. This shows that although the law does not always mean justice, it is still important to him.
At the end of the play, the lights fade and focus on Alfieri, who delivers the concluding speech. Here he tells us how the death of Eddie was “useless”, not needed and how he still likes him. Eddie died the death of a tragic hero in the Greek Tragedy. He caused his own downfall. Also the themes of justice and law and the importance of both, how the law is right but justice are fair. That Marco killed Eddie as it was his justice for Eddie killing his children “He killed my children!” The law is the rule but it is unfair, although the right thing to do. The law is unjust for these people and they do not believe it is as important as what they see as justice.
Alfieri is both a character and a narrator he would act as a character and step out of this role to recap, comment and give personal opinions of the last scene and gives an indication or warning of the upcoming scene. He raises the themes of justice and law and their interpretations in this play. Alfieri’s dramatic purpose is to add tension and suspense to the story as well as helping the audience to understand the story better. He adds exciting narrative and is also an important character used to show the true feelings of Eddie by being the only person Eddie talks to. He is a tool used by Miller to explain the play better and expose the thoughts of other characters as well as his own.
In conclusion I feel that justice and the law do not follow each other. Millar obviously believes this as well, as he shows so much evidence to make the audience think about the differences between the two. He shows that different people see justice in different ways. For example Marco sees justice as working in the country to feed his family “He killed my children”, but Eddie sees justice as reporting him so that he can keep Catherine to himself, and Rodolfo will not take her away from him. Therefore we can see that there are many tensions between law and justice, because the community law is so strong, and the respect for other people in their community is so strong.
By Nayan Patel