Private Vs Public Self in Arthur Miller‘s A View from the Bridge

Abstract

The research explores how self is characterized in Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge in order to have a better/deeper understanding of the self (private vs public). The quest for self is expressed through an obsessive yearning for a young lady, which has been lost due to various reasons. Miller in A View from the Bridge depicts the struggle between the self of an individual and the public self the individual is compelled to put on as a mask which is analyzed via Freud’s psycho-sexual and Ericson’s psycho-social spectacle of psychoanalysis. The outmost reality of escape from tragic duality of self is to accept the fragments of happiness and sadness since there is inevitability of complication and unpredictability in a dramatic world of indifference which is devoid of concern for those less fortunate. Such is the case of the tragic protagonist, Eddie Carbone who as a victim of both social and psychological system paves his own way to annihilation owing to his tragic flaw of obsession with his niece, Catherine. The play has interwoven the crisis of self in the life of individuals and broader changes taking place in the American society. Moreover, the study tries to display the intersection of psychological, social and emotional factors to which an individual self is subjected. Key Words: Betrayal, destruction, duality, identity, obsession, psychoanalysis, search, self, society