The Contrasting of America and Italy in A View from the Bridge :: English Literature

The Contrasting of America and Italy in A opinion from the BridgeArthur Millers A View from the Bridge presents many different viewsof America, not only do you see America through the eyes of anImmigrant but also through the eyes of the continual working people, forinstance the longshoremen.Within Alfieris speech, we get our first ideas of what America waslike for Eddie, Beatrice and Catherine. The speech highlights,cultural connections Frankie Yale himself was cut precisely in halfby a machine gun on the corner of Union Street this shows theinfluence and grip the Mafia had over Ameri sens Culture in the 1950s.When describing the area, where Eddie and Beatrice live, he describesit as the spend that faces the bay which gives the impression, of arun down area where only the poor live. He uses the simile the gulletof New York, swallowing the tonnage of the world. Which gives imageof a place that has boats approach path from all over the world laden withcargo and more. It gives Red H ook, the image of an unsightly place,where people have to work to their limit to feed and support theirfamilies.In my opinion Eddie, Beatrice and Catherine are there to show thetypical Italian American family of the 1950s. Their house is whatmost of the longshoremen and their families would live in. It is onlya small tenement flat. In the early section of Act One, Millercontrasts the flat, to the living conditions in Sicily and SouthernItaly, he voices the comparison through Eddies response, toBeatrices worries about needing a new table framework and cleaning theflat, which is listen, theyll think this its a millionaires housecompared to the way they live. This is showing, why there were somany immigrants coming into America, the living conditions were somuch better than in their countries, even the poorest were living likeKings in the eyes of the immigrants.Catherine, I believe is symbolising the future, because she is theone, who wants to move on with her life, and become a stenog rapher andwork for a company. But Eddie, who still believes in the archaic waysthat the man should do the working, tries to discourage her fromtaking the job. In a way, Catherine being offered the job is showingthe American Way that anyone can get a job in America, even animmigrant.But soon the conversation turns back to Beatrices immigrant cousinsand about the American Immigration Bureau. This gives the image of a dry land full of rules and regulations, a place where there is law and