John Proctor

The famous philosopher Aristotle defines a tragic hero as “The change in the hero's fortunes be not from misery to happiness, but on the contrary, from happiness to misery, and the cause of it must not lie in any depravity but in some great error on his part.” Arthur Miller constructs The Crucible to be a never ending tragic spiral leading to many peoples death which creates several by- products of destruction to everyone in the town of Salem. John Proctor can be labeled as one of the protagonist in the play as the story is partly centered on him. He makes a clearly a suitable character for the tragic hero because he has an integrity stabbing flaw, he has to choose between his fate and his reputation, and as far as morals go, he is definitively better than the other characters in the play although there are many defects in his character. John Proctor is a prime representation of a tragic hero. The quality of possessing and steadfastly adhering to high moral principles or professional standards is the definition of integrity and the definition of John Proctor. Proctor is very highly respected in the town of Salem due to his high principles shown. Unfortunately, as the tragic hero, he has done something that has severely damaged his high integrity. Proctor cheated on Elizabeth with Abigail. In a town as religiously influenced as Salem, this hurts Proctor’s reputation because committing adultery is against one of the Ten Commandments. Ironically, when asked to recite the Ten Commandments by Reverend Hale, he forgets about the commandment stating, “You shall not commit adultery.” John admits to having an affair with Abigail Williams in the court hearing in hope to prove her accusations false. When they call his wife out, Elizabeth, she is unaware that he has confessed as Danforth states, “Answer my question! Is your husband a leacher!” Elizabeth then faintly says “No, sir.” Doing so, she has doomed them both. Having an affair with Abigail Williams