How does Arthur Miller show the strains on the Carbone household in the scene where the audience first meets Eddie, Catherine and Beatrice?

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Salman Uddin                    11M 2325

How does Arthur Miller show the strains on the Carbone household in the scene where the audience first meets Eddie, Catherine and Beatrice?

A View from the Bridge is mainly about a man called Eddie Carbone, a docker who lives and works in New York.  He migrated from Sicily with his wife Beatrice and her neice Catherine.  He has worked very hard to bring Catherine up.  His relationship with his wife Beatrice is quite good.  However, they have been going through a rough patch at the moment due to which their sexual relationship has been suffering.  Like a father, Eddie is very protective of Catherine and as time goes on he realises that he is too close to Catherine.  As you can see there are a lot of strains between the people of the household.  However, when Beatrice’s cousins arrive, things get considerably worse.  Marco and Rodolpho have come from Sicily as illegal immigrants and have to be kept hidden.  They should be kept hidden as it is part of the Sicilian code of honour.  Rodolpho, the younger of the two brothers, and Catherine fall in love.  When Eddie realises he goes crazy with jealousy.  He becomes so determined to get rid of Rodolpho and Marco that he snitches to the immigration authority even though he knows that his own community will treat him as an outcast.  Marco and Rodolpho get caught but when they come out on bail, Marco kills Eddie.

        

The relationship between Eddie and Beatrice isn’t as close as it was before.  The story starts when Eddie comes home from work.  He starts talking to Catherine even though he has important information for Beatrice.  This shows that he has a closer relationship with Catherine than Beatrice.  Even when he’s telling Beatrice that her cousins are arriving he doesn’t tell the news straight to her, he says to Catherine ‘her cousins landed’.  Beatrice only knows about her cousins when she hears Eddie talking to Catherine.  Then when he does speak to Beatrice he doesn’t speak to her properly:

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      EDDIE     “…. (calls) Hey B, what’re you doin’ there?”

This gives the impression that Beatrice and Eddie aren’t getting along.  There are a lot of differences between the first meeting between Eddie and Catherine and the meeting between Eddie and Beatrice.  In the meeting between Eddie and Catherine he compliments her on her looks but he does not compliment Beatrice on her looks in their meeting.  This suggests that Eddie doesn’t find Beatrice as attractive as Catherine.

        We also get the suggestion that Eddie and Beatrice are having problems in bed.  Eddie ...

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