Comparing The Crucible And V For Vendetta

1. Both Arthur Miller, the author of The Crucible, and James McTeigue, the director of V for Vendetta, both convey the idea that 'governments should be afraid of their people'. Both texts express how the governments could control their people; however that control can lead to anarchy. Miller explains how the people ‘were not quite the dedicated folk that arrived on the Mayflower, [as] a vast differentiation had taken place, and in their own time a revolution unseated the royal government… at this moment of power'. Expressing how the people were controlling the government and how they were consumed by the power that they held. McTeigue expresses how the government would initially manipulate the people with how they controlled them, by treating them as lower class and enforcing laws. However, V’s rebellion, starting with blowing up the Old Bailey, caused the government to slowly begin losing control over its people as V conveyed his message and the power slowly shifted as the people

Both Miller and McTeigue utilise the technique of setting in their texts to express how dark and oppressed both societies were within both texts. Miller sets The Crucible in the place of 'Salem, Massachusetts, in the spring of the year 1962' explaining how 'the people of Salem in 1692 were not quite a dedicated folk'. He also conveys a depressive society during the 1960's due to the witchcraft happening and also the strict rules of either working or praying. McTeigue conveys V for Vendetta in the location of London as being oppressive and always in uniform due to the overpowering governments. Both texts also express how there was patrol in the settings to convey further ideas of the oppressed governments. He also utilises the curfew and patrolling to further convey how much control the government had. The setting is expressed to the adult audience with the conveying of how the government was powerful. Through setting, both Miller and McTeigue express how the government was