Alfieri is also used as a theatrical and structural device. Arthur Miller tries to incorporate the features of a Greek Tragedy; Alfieri is like the chorus, the actors who tell the audience about what is happening but are not actually part of the scene. Alfieri is a main part of Miller’s stage craft; his positioning on stage is usually at the desk (as it says on page 49); which has connotations with a news reader which follows the proposal that he is professional, trusted and knowledgeable; this connotation is also relevant because he is informing the audience on the events in the scene. Alfieri, during the whole play, never actually leaves the stage he is just shown with a spot light at the relevant times, to make it seem that he is an onlooker, just like the audience. Another link between Alfieri and a news reader is that he gives news before any one else knows about it ‘I could see every step coming, step after step’. He also is like a reporter because on page 65 he gives very precise information about what he goes on to talk about ‘On December twenty-seventh I saw him next’ similarly to a news reader. Alfieri is used by Arthur Miller as a way to move smoothly between the main scenes and clearly shows the beginning and end of an act. He performs monologues just after a shocking and surprising events in the Drama; for example at the end after the climactic death of Eddie, Alfieri calms the audience by explaining in a very philosophical way why this had happened ‘it is better to settle for half’. He also does this at the end of the first scene to re-set the scene and to establish the new action which is about to take place in the next half of the play.
As Alfieri is an American Lawyer he represents many laws, but these are very different to the values and codes of law in the Italian community; they take the law into their own hands if necessary. For instance, before the beginning of the next scene on page 65, Eddie is having an argument with Rodolpho for getting to close to Catherine. He is threatening to tell the US government about his ‘submarine’ status (because he came into the country below the law). Alfieri builds the tension between them by describing Eddie’s eyes as ‘tunnels’ (this is a repeated motif as it is also used at the very beginning of the play) and ‘how dark the room became’. In this section Alfieri speaks with the voice of the American law; he tells Eddie that there is nothing he can legally do a bout it with these words ‘morally and legally you have no rights, you cannot stop it; she is a free agent’. He also advises Eddie not to use his Italian codes, because he knows it will get him into trouble with the American law; Alfieri says ‘you can’t stop it’ to try and warn Eddie. He also tries to warn Eddie by using the image of the river which will’ drown you [Eddie] if you buck now’, this image relates to the title which heightens its importance; also as we know the two of them are in Alfieri’s office which looks over the Brooklyn bridge and the river that rushes beneath it, making it even clearer to Eddie. The river can also signify that Catherine falling in love with Rodolpho is natural and flowing well just like a river, but the love that Eddie has for Catherine is not natural and there is nothing that he can do to change it.
Alfieri warns Eddie that he ‘won’t have a friend in the world’ if he tells the US government about Rodolpho’s illegal inhabitance; this is very wise advice because the friends that he has at the time will turn against him because betrayal is one of the worst offences you could commit in the Italian community, and by handing over information about Rodolpho, he is unlikely to make any true friends. During this part of the scene there is a [lonely blue] light which has connotations with depression and isolation which foreshadows Eddies future state. Through Alfieri, miller compares the two types of justice; US law and the Italian set of laws. Alfieri allows the audience to see both sides of the story but does not actually give his opinions; this forces the audience to start thinking deeply about the play and which side they agree with and start making our own judgments. This technique that Miller uses makes the audience feel more apart of the play, and become more involved in the action.
Betrayal is a key theme in this tragedy, the first example we hear of it is when Beatrice relates the tale of what happened to Vinny, another man in a similar position to Eddie; therefore the story of Vinny Bolanzo is an omen and therefore dramatic irony. Vinny, another member of the Italian community was fourteen when he ‘snitched to the immigration’ about his own Uncle who was an illegal immigrant hiding in his family’s home, he was not forgiven and ‘they spit on him in the street, his own father and brothers’, after Vinny committed this ultimate sin in the Italian community he had no-one which foreshadows Eddie’s position at the end of the play. When this drama was set, after the Second World War, there was a big anti-communist movement in the US government, this later became known as McCarthyism. This is why people were persuaded to ‘snitch to immigration’ about illegal immigrants to help stop communist ideas spreading into America. The US government thought that Italians would believe in these sorts of ideas because during the war they were run by a fascist dictator and had close ties with Nazi Germany. However, the law was often abused to remove people that other citizens did not like for instance homosexuals were targeted along with people who were not form American decent. This sort of behavior is completely opposite to the Italian codes and values which are imbedded in the storyline. This is why Marco marks a vendetta against Eddie, after he finds out that he had told immigration, he tells Alfieri of this and relates that ‘in my country he would be dead by now’; which shows just how significant this betrayal is and how important it is to gain justice to Italians.
Miller through Alfieri raises two very important issues in the play and in New York at the time; the major difference between Italian law and the conventional US law and the central quote ‘better to settle for half’ in the electrify last scene. However, as you think a lawyer would, Alfieri does not come up with a solution, but he does make the audience think about what they think themselves and he wants them to realise that there is not a clear cut answer.
We can often compare Alfieri and Miller because they both were trying to fight for higher status in American society. They felt as if they were perceived as less of an American because of their immigrant background. Alfieri’s two functions in this play as a retrospective narrator and as a character make him an integral part of the play. This is undeniable evidence that Alfieri is a very important character in this modern tragedy written by Arthur Miller
