‘The Crucible’ is a novel which was written by Arthur Miller in 1953. It takes place during the times of the Salem witch trials in Massachusetts. This was a time of much hypocrisy in the people of the town of Salem. Many people believed anything they heard or saw. Although The Crucible is fictitious, the story depicts the historical information of the Salem witch trials, and blends them with fictitious characters to create a very realistic plot and conflict in the story. Miller wrote this play as a response to the political environment in which he lived. The story relates to the McCarthy trials. During the 1950's Senator Joseph McCarthy accused many American leaders of being communists. This lead to many accusations that people were communists. Some people believed him because they had fear of communism. McCarthy was, in effect, conducting "witch hunts". The Red Scare was a witch hunt where the US government was searching for "dangerous communists." Accusations came from left and right, much the same as the characters did for "real witches" in The Crucible. This meant that people were forced to either confess to the crime of witchery or shove the blame towards a different person. As an effect of this bias, the accused were never discharged, but were given the opportunity to confess to the crime of witchcraft to lessen their sentence. With the red scare, the accused were given a chance to give up names of other suspected communists to lessen their sentence as well. In both situations, there were people who confessed even though they had no relation to the crime at all. The majority, however, valued their morals and refused to give into political pressure by lying. This is shown as abuse of power. The puritans were a group of English Protestants in the 16th and 17th century. The entire plot of the novel is moulded by the repressive Puritan society. Like many puritan women, Elizabeth Proctor is dutiful and loves her husband dearly. Yet, Elizabeth is hurt by the fact…
Few experiences are as helpful for us to understand ourselves and our world as reading a great work of literature. When we read about interesting characters, we learn how to recognize the faults that affect us all. In Arthur Miller's play, the Crucible ,an examination of the characters teachers us about the dangers of hypocrisy, peer pressure, and personal, weakness. The hypocrisy of the characters in this play shows that they only care about the selves, and not about what they preach. For example, early in the play, there is a scene where Parris taking to Abigail about seeing girls dancing in the forest, and his worried about losing his job if people of the village find out. Parris tells Abigail "But if you trafficked with spirits in the forest…
Quote 5: Betty says to Abigail, "You drank blood, Abby! You didn't tell him that! You did, you did! You drank a charm to kill John Proctor's wife! You drank a charm to kill Goody Proctor!"…
Honesty is the most important thing in life,and what keeps relationships healthy between people,and hysteria is widespread in many countries. People accuse each other for wrong doing even though they weren’t sure. In The crucible by Arthur miller written in 1692 proposes how people long ago used to act concerning witchcrafts ,and to face in certain situations in Salem, Massachusetts. Most of the people were fanatics and they were involved in prayers and church , they punished the people who don’t obide by the rules of the church.They also weren’t honest to each other , like manipulating and hysteria.There are many themes which are clearly stated in The crucible but the main theme is dishonesty , accusing people for committing wrong doingand hatred between them.…
Many people blame each other without any information. The key factor in any argument can be described as evidence or proof. Proof results in many solutions without argument. This term describes something the people in The Crucible did not have any knowledge of. Everyone in the story as well as the real world assume a person's misdeeds. Without knowing the facts, innocence cannot be proven. Proof plays a critical factor to determine a person’s misdeeds.…
The law does not always mean justice. Arthur Miller presents this truth through his play The Crucible. The short play makes fiction of the real events that took place in Salem in 1692. It follows a young manipulative girl, Abigail Williams, who uses the whispers of witchcraft to her advantage to gain what she desires. The lie quickly grows and the people are forced to cry out witchery in order to save themselves from an unjustly court.…
Mask: "Furious Casey pushed Richman backward, shoving him through the door to the women's room. Richman started to laugh. "Jeeze, Casey, I didn't know you cared ""…
Guilt has always been around, it consumes us with worry about something that’s impossible to change. But isn’t having guilt what makes us human or good? Doesn’t it show that we do have a soul? Having guilt makes us human, it makes us grow and try to become someone better than we were yesterday. In the Crucible by Arthur Miller many characters are engulfed in guilt and are either punished or rewarded by it. Arthur Miller uses these characters to show how guilt can make you want to become a better person.…
In The Crucible, the author, Arthur Miller, demonstrates many examples of the complexity of “good” and “evil” in his characters. He does this through many characters, seen and unseen. Perhaps the most lucid representations of these two ideas are achieved through the acts of manipulation, anger, hate, and pureness that a few characters consistently provide.…
A person can become deceitful to make themselves look innocent and have others view them as victims. When in times of desperation, individuals will become dishonest and insincere. Tom walker becomes deceitful after being accused of taking money from innocent people for his own personal interests. This is accusation is denied by Tom claiming "the devil take me if I have made a farthing" (Irving 331), acting as if he were innocent and his life would be threatened if he collected greats amount amount and did not give it to the devil. This is an attempt to seek for pity from his clients, possibly alerting their view of him from greedy thief to victim. In this case, Tom became deceitful as a ploy to further help him in getting what he wants by removing the negative attention off…
Lying and Deceit-A lie (also called prevarication, falsehood) is a type of deception in the form of an untruthful statement, especially with the intention to deceive others, often with the further intention to maintain a secret or reputation, protect someone's feelings or to avoid a punishment or repercussion for one's actions. Deceit is fraudulence, the quality of being fraudulent misrepresentation, or a misleading falsehood. deception: the act of deceiving…
Fear and Hysteria destroy Good Judgment because when a part of yourself feels fear or paranoia (Hysteria), your judgement goes away and you do anything you can to do away with that uncomfortable feeling. In the Crucible, the three girls Abigail, Mary, and Susanna are filled with fear and hysteria of getting into trouble and being spanked so they turn to the most drastic judgment they have and start accusing people of witchcraft to prevent their own punishment and put that uneasy feeling of uncomfortability to rest. They also had a slight prompt on their side that another town had gone through the witch trials and had a mass hysteria and fear of the same thing the girls had brought up. With fear and hysteria built in their hearts, the girls…
In novella of The Crucible by Arthur Miller the implications can be inferred regarding the scapegoat phenomenon in America today in how we perceive people getting accused of things they are not doing. For instance Muslims are considered bad people only because they had a few terrorist people in their population. The key lessons from the period of time during The Crucible reflects how we could have learned differently. Several people were accused of witchcraft most times they had never practiced witchcraft before. “I saw Sarah Good with the Devil! I saw Goody Osburn with the Devil! I saw Bridget Bishop with the Devil!” (Miller 50). This quote is proving the reasoning against how the girls would accuse people of doing witchcraft.…
The title the “crucible” by Author Miller is a metaphor for the witch trial in Salem that manipulates the impure hearts just as the crucible melts impure metal. The crucible was set in the Puritan society where religion was strict and everything; everyone was either belong to god or the devil. People in the Puritan society used that as a tool to gain power and wealth. Throughout the witch trial, many people with impure hearts were manipulated by the overwhelming power of being connected to god and tried to benefit from it but eventually it led to their own destruction such as Abigail, Thomas Putnam and Paris. On the other hand many people with pure hearts were willing to be hanged than named other people such as Giles Corey and John Proctor.…
Without a doubt, there is a strong connection between our emotions and our native language. I don’t have to look any further than my own marriage for evidence of this. You see, my wife is Japanese, and the two of us speak English with each other on a daily basis. However, as soon as she gets angry or excited, she immediately and quite naturally switches to Japanese. And I do the same: if I’m speaking Japanese with someone and I get upset about something, English comes flowing right out of my mouth, almost uncontrollably. I think this phenomenon comes as no surprise to anyone who speaks a foreign language.…