An English critical essay on why Eddie Carbone deserves his fate. www.myetutor.tv

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Choose a drama in which one of the main characters deserves their fate.
Explain what happens in the play and detail why the character is deserving of the fate
that befalls them.
Tragedy is usually reserved for characters who do not deserve their fate. The victims in
tragic plays are usually men who have a rare combination of qualities that makes them heroic.
Because they are heroic, then their fate becomes tragic. Even some of Shakespeare’s villains
have noble and heroic qualities, although some people may argue that they deserve to die for
the bad deeds they have committed. It is less often that the main character of a play deserves to
die. However, in Arthur Miller’s ‘A View from the Bridge’ it can be argued that Eddie
deserves his fate of dying in the street. This essay will explain clearly that this is the case.
In the play Eddie is a dockworker at the busiest harbour in the world, New York – the
‘gullet’ of the world. He is of Italian decent and lives among the tight-knit Italian community
with its rules and strong family connections. Living with Eddie is his wife, Beatrice, and his
niece, Catherine. Eddie has been a father to his niece having made many sacrifices for her,
however he has, as she grows up, becomes more controlling of her. When Beatrice’s cousins
from Italy come to stay – Marco and Rodolfo – matters come to a head: Catherine falls for
Roldolfo. Eddie becomes jealousy, controlling and aggressive, before he finally throws both
men out and then, breaking every code of the Italian community, he informs on both men to
immigration services. Both men need the work for them and their families to survive. Marco
swears revenge on Eddie. Their confrontation in the street is brief, where Eddie ,somewhat
cowardly, brings out a knife. In the fight, however, the knife is turned on Eddie and he dies in
the street.
A character that does not deserve his fate would be one that has many noble qualities.
This is not the case with Eddie. In Act I he comes across as a controlling man, who has an
unhealthy interest in his niece’s growing sexual awareness:
“Eddie: Now don’t aggravate me, Katie, you are walkin’ wavy! I
don’t like the looks they’re givin’ you in the candy store.
And with them new high heels on the sidewalk – clack, clack,
clack. The heads are turnin’ like windmills.
Catherine: But those guys look at all the girls, you know that.
Eddie: You ain’t ‘all the girls’.”
Miller portrays Eddie as a man who is taking a somewhat unhealthy interest in his niece
and rather pettily criticises her for wanting to be a young woman. He tries to use the words
‘wavy’ which suggests he’s awkward and wanting to cover-up what he really means –
probably because if he did not then he would be forced to admit how ridiculous he actually is
being. He seems to want to deny Catherine the right to act as she wishes and for her to gain the
attention that is natural. He seems to prize her in a way that means that she cannot grow-up to
be like ‘all the girls’. By doing so he stunts her growth. There may be villains in other plays but
not that many that act so pettily. Miller presents Eddie as both petty, controlling and there is a
suggestion of violence, ‘don’t aggravate me Katie’, that suggest a deeply unpleasant man, who,
although not deserving to die based on this, we cannot say his death is tragic.
It becomes clearer that Eddie deserves his end as the play progresses. Rudolfo has
obviously caught Catherine’s eye: Eddie sees this. Rudolfo is a generally sweet and pleasant
young man, but Eddie, angered by Catherine and Rodolfo dancing, uses the excuse of a
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‘pretend’ boxing match to teach Rodolfo a lesson and serve a warning. The whole family are
watching:
“Catherine: (with beginning alarm) What are they doin’?
They are lightly boxing now.
Beatrice: (she senses only the comradeship in it now) He’s teachin’
him; he’s very good!
Eddie: Sure, he’s terrific! Look at him go! (Rodolfo lands a blow.)
‘At’s it! Now, watch out, here I come, Danish! (He feints
with his left hand and lands with his right. It mildly staggers
Rodolfo. Marco rises.)”
Eddie strikes Rodolfo out of jealousy and spite. He uses the excuse of teaching Rodolfo
some boxing moves to serve notice to Rodolfo to stay away from Catherine. It is Catherine
who first senses this as she knows Eddie and his possessive ways too well. Beatrice appears to
blind to this side of Eddie. Eddie’s blow is such a powerful one that it makes Rodolfo stagger
and Marco instinctively rises to defend his brother. Miller shows Eddie to be a cowardly,
spiteful person: under the pretence of a help, he hits another man, and he is able to use the
excuse that it is was all only a ‘joke’. This lack of character does not qualify Eddie for an
heroic fate, but rather a miserable one. Eddie also tries to demean and patronise Rodolfo with
the nickname of ‘Danish’. Not a very kind thing to be doing.
Miller’s depiction of a man who deserves his fate is clarified as the play moves towards
its conclusion. Eddie has informed immigration services, and this means the men will be
deported. He did it anonymously, but everyone knows. The entire community has ostracised
him because he has broken one of its fundamental rules. Unlike heroic characters, Eddie is
being undone by his own low character. Catherine, who loved him, makes clear what she
thinks of him:
“Catherine: How can you listen to him? This rat!
Beatrice: (shaking Catherine) Don’t you call him that!
Catherine: (clearing from Beatrice) What’re you scared of?
He’s a rat! He belongs in the sewer!
Beatrice: Stop it!
Catherine: (weeping) He bites people when they sleep! He
comes when nobody’s lookin’ and poisons decent
people. In the garbage he belongs!”
Catherine who used to get upset if he disapproved now despises him and
compares him to a rodent. Eddie’s behaviour has alienated even the people he loves. She
implies that Beatrice would say the same except that she is frightened of Eddie – again
returning to the idea that Eddie is a bully around the house. Catherine is so disillusioned by
Eddie that she cries as she accuses him: he acts in a sneaky and underhand way, destroying the
lives of decent people as he does so. As far as Catherine, and the rest of the Italian community
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are concerned, he has dishonoured himself, and betrayed people under his care. Often tragic
heroes are hated, but they are never contemptible. Miller’s depiction of Eddie’s base betrayal
illustrates that he feels Eddie’s fate is just.
When Marco comes to punish Eddie for his ‘crime’ against him, his family and brother,
Eddie again shows a lowness of character that renders him contemptible in the eyes of the
reader. He has concealed a knife so as to swing the fight in his favour:
“Eddie goes down with the blow and Marco starts to raise a foot
to stomp him when Eddie springs a knife into his hand and Marco
steps back. Louis rushes in toward Eddie.
Louis: Eddie, for Christ’s sake!
Eddie raises the knife and Louis halts and steps back.
Eddie: You lied about me, Marco. Now say it. Come on now,
say it!
Marco: Anima-a-a-l!
Eddie lunges with the knife. Marco grabs his arm, turning the
blade inward and pressing it home as the women and Louis and
Mike rush in and separate them, and Eddie, the knife still in his
hand, falls to his knees before Marco.”
Eddie has brought a knife and even his once-friends like Louis think this is too far. Yet
it doesn’t stop Eddie threatening Louis. Eddie wants Marco to admit he lied: Marco hasn’t lied.
Therefore, even at the end Eddie cheats when he fights and lies. Marco calls him a
contemptuous name, rather than surrendering, and it is a contempt shared by Miller. This is
clearly explained as not only is Eddie killed by his own knife that was held in his own hand, a
telling irony, but before he dies he symbolically falls on his knees to Marco and therefore
shows in the eyes of the reader and the playwright the justness and morality of Marco’s cause
and not Eddie’s. Eddie dies a low death in the street, like a rat, and even at the end cannot
forgive his niece for doing nothing more than wanting to love and be loved.
Having chosen a character that deserves the fate that befalls him, Miller makes clear
that fate is deserved by depictions of Eddie at home, by his low attempts to provoke Rodolfo,
by his betrayal of the community and of his ignoble end. Eddie is a well-drawn character, but
he is not a tragic hero. Miller has made it clear in many ways, most of all by the symbolism of
the ending, that he believes that Eddie’s death is just. Whatever we call ‘A View from the
Bridge’ therefore, we cannot call it a tragedy.
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