The Male Gaze in Arthur Miller’s A View From the Bridge

Abstract

Ever since being refused a license in the United Kingdom in 1956, due to its onstage kiss between two men, A View From the Bridge has been a target for queer theory. Eddie accuses Rodolpho of being gay, and the kiss is meant to offer Catherine verification of this. Such circumstantial evidence is hardly condemning, and many have questioned whether Rodolpho is in fact gay, without any clear consensus. Others have persuasively postulated the possibility of Eddie’s gayness. However, the play’s “view” of events is from not Eddie’s point of view but Alfieri’s; he is the one standing on the metaphorical bridge with an ambiguous inability to become fully engaged, and it is his male gaze that honors Eddie. If anyone in this play could be “viewed” as gay, might we consider the lawyer, who confesses his attraction but feels he must couch his desire in metaphor.