The Crucible Rhetorical Devices
Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible, is an act of desperation and fear to criticize the defamation of early Salem, his generation, and future generations to come. Miller argues how his play is to show everyone how fear bends one’s morals; “Much of my desperation branched...from a typical Depression...the blow struck on the mind by the rise of power European Fascism and the brutal anti-semitism it had brought to power” (Miller). He provides examples of “the hunts for Reds in America”, referring to hunts for communist, and the extermination of Jews in Germany. The hunt for witches was an act of fear and greed, in the early 1600s in Salem-to deflect accusations on others, gain land, or revenge on a neighbor. Miller also goes into depth with his
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(Arthur Miller uses a wide range of rhetorical devices to achieve his message.) He begins with personifying paranoia: “I know that its paranoid center is stilling pumping out the same darkly attractive warning…” (Miller). By personifying paranoia, it gives this fear and anxiety life, as if it was a blood stream that courses through the veins of Americans. He also describes paranoia as a disease; “it may simply be a fascination with the outbreak of paranoia” (Miller). The word choice of “outbreak” creates imagery and represents how efficiently and quickly people can be corrupt by paranoia and having no knowledge of it; “the blind panic” (Miller). To continue, while Arthur Miller presents the different interpretations his play receives, “For some, the play seems to be about the dilemma of relying on the testimony of the small children accusing adults of sexual abuse…” (Miller), he describes the accusers as small children. The accusers are young; however, not all of them are not children. This shows how even though they are slightly older, they act as children and are treated as such. The use of diction shows the lifestyle and culture of salem. Moreover, Miller utilizes logical appeals to support claim of how witch hunts still exist: “the Salem interrogations turn out to be eerily exact models of…Stalin’s Russia, Pinochet’s Chile, Mao’s China, and other regimes” (Miller). Providing factual evidence strengthens his
(Arthur Miller uses a wide range of rhetorical devices to achieve his message.) He begins with personifying paranoia: “I know that its paranoid center is stilling pumping out the same darkly attractive warning…” (Miller). By personifying paranoia, it gives this fear and anxiety life, as if it was a blood stream that courses through the veins of Americans. He also describes paranoia as a disease; “it may simply be a fascination with the outbreak of paranoia” (Miller). The word choice of “outbreak” creates imagery and represents how efficiently and quickly people can be corrupt by paranoia and having no knowledge of it; “the blind panic” (Miller). To continue, while Arthur Miller presents the different interpretations his play receives, “For some, the play seems to be about the dilemma of relying on the testimony of the small children accusing adults of sexual abuse…” (Miller), he describes the accusers as small children. The accusers are young; however, not all of them are not children. This shows how even though they are slightly older, they act as children and are treated as such. The use of diction shows the lifestyle and culture of salem. Moreover, Miller utilizes logical appeals to support claim of how witch hunts still exist: “the Salem interrogations turn out to be eerily exact models of…Stalin’s Russia, Pinochet’s Chile, Mao’s China, and other regimes” (Miller). Providing factual evidence strengthens his