Marco shows conventionally masculine characteristics. For example when Eddie can’t lift the chair and Marco can with hardly any effort. This hurts Eddie’s ego and makes Eddie feel threatened; the only way Eddie knows how to deal with felling threatened is to be aggressive. Eddie dealing with his emotions like this shows that Eddie is very badly educated and in some ways immature. You can tell Eddie is badly educated by his use of language, he shortens a lot of his words, such as are not he shortens to “ain’t”. But conflict also occurs on a smaller scale when Eddie tells Catherine that he dislikes her new clothes. Eddie dislikes Marco although he conforms to Eddie’s idea of what a man should be like; he is strong and is always thinking about providing for his family. In these ways Marco is more “manly” than Eddie and although he would never admit it this makes Eddie feel very uncomfortable and on edge around him.
When Eddie is discussing Roldolfo to the other longshoremen he implies that he is not right and is no good.
Eddie never actually tells Roldolfo about his distrust in him, but when he is showing him how to be a boxer he hits him and convinces everyone it was by accident. But because Eddie never confronts Roldolfo or Marco about his distrust of them this makes Eddie cowardly and shows that he does not live up to his own expectations of a man and his roles. Marco senses Eddie’s dislike of him and is immediately aggressive to him, but he still does not confront Eddie but he does show his power over Eddie by challenging him to lift the chair at the end of Act One.
At the beginning of Act Two Eddie kisses Roldolfo and Catherine, this is a very intense part of the play because it is the only time, apart form when they are boxing, that Rodolfo physically touches Eddie. He grabs his arm and tells him to “Stop that! Have respect for her” because Eddie is forcibly kissing Catherine. Eddie has been drinking and this gives the impression that he is very unpredictable. He kisses Catherine very passionately; this shows that Eddie cares about Catherine a lot more than originally shown in the play. This is one of the reasons why he is so bitter about Catherine Marrying Roldolfo. It is the only time Eddie shows his dislike of Rodolfo. When he kisses Rodolfo he does it as a way of humiliating him as he feels as he is humiliating his family by marring Catherine just to stay in the country.
Although Eddies views are prejudice he is still only doing what he can to protect his family from what he believes is wrong. Although Eddie and Marco never get along and in the end they both want the other one to be dead, they share very similar views, they are both very protective to their families and they both of them like to be in control. These two characteristics clash between the characters and this leads to more aggression and friction between the two.
The female characters play a very important part in the play, they help show how narrow minded Eddie is about his views and they help show how badly Eddie reacts to criticism. Beatrice try’s to blame Catherine and herself for Eddie’s death. She says “whatever happened we all done it, and don’t you ever forget it”. She means that Eddie’s death is not just his fault, it is everyone involved. But I think this is untrue. I think that Eddie is to blame because through out the play he was hostile to Roldolfo and Marco, and ignores any advice given by anyone else. If he had treated them with more respect, the type of respect Eddie likes to be treated with, the tragedy would never have happened.
Alfieri is used to inform the audience on any action that is missed, because he is a lawyer the audience feels they can trust and respect his opinion. Another reason I think Alfieri is a Lawyer is because he gives the characters someone to talk to, without him the audience would never know what Eddie was thinking. Alfieri is detached emotionally from the other characters in the play, this gives him the ability to over look the play and to be rational about the other characters situations. This gives the audience the feeling Alfieri has “A View From A Bridge” and is looking over the play. Alfieri’s scenes are used to move on time, develop the plot and setting a new time and place. Alfieri is a close friend of Eddie’s and he helps guide him, but Eddie ignores what Alfieri advises. Alfieri opens the play, and he closes it with some very strong words “Most of the time now we settle for half and I like it better”. Alfieri is implying that he thinks Eddie was selfish, and if he just settled with Catherine and him being friends, he would still be alive now. He lost everything because he was selfish. Alfieri generalises all of his other clients by saying Eddie is “not purely good, but himself purely, for he allowed himself to be wholly known and for that I will love him more than any my sensible clients”. By this statement Alfieri means that Although Eddie was wrong with his views he was just being himself.
Manliness, Hostility and Aggression are obvious themes though out the play and they are all very closely linked. Because of Eddies views on manliness he is Hostile towards Roldolfo from as soon as he meets him. This then leads to aggression between Marco and Eddie, which ends in Eddie having his life taken from him all because of his shallow views and poor education.
