Arthur Miller was quite marvelous as were his plays. He indeed was a playwright, and wrote multiple plays throughout his career. One of his works was called The Crucible; it’s a commendable piece of art. It has to do with the Salem Witch Trials which took place in the 1600’s. The trials turned friends into enemies. It made the Salem, Massachusetts a vulnerable location in the United States. It brought out some of their worst characteristics. Jealousy was in the spotlight of this story, for the character Abigail Williams. Jealousy is a disease that can manipulate one’s mind; Abigail falls in Love with John Proctor. But, Proctor is married to Elizabeth Proctor. As time passes she grows jealous of his wife. She tries numerous times to eliminate …show more content…
One would think she is an innocent girl. Well that person would be wrong. In the story it states that Abigail Williams and John Proctor fondled with each other. This little affair sparked this young woman’s interest in the older man, John Proctor. John has feelings for her until the end of the story but they will fade. He knows he must be loyal to his wife. So he tries to push her away. Abigail Williams won’t give up on Proctor no matter what. She is aware that she will have to overcome some obstacles. The girls and Tituba, a slave, were caught doing some things that are deemed unholy in their community. They were singing, dancing, and creating charms. Well Abigail created and “drank a charm to kill John Proctors wife.”(Miller 148) Elizabeth proctor is the most challenging obstacle she must conquer. So her first attempt was to bring death upon her in a. As you can see, jealousy is grasping firmly onto her …show more content…
The community is vulnerable and weak during this time. All accusations were taken seriously and were taken to the court of Salem. Well Abigail thinks that if she accuses Goody Proctor of murder, that Elizabeth will be hanged or that she will rot away in prison for the rest of her life. She stuck a pin in her stomach and accused poor Elizabeth of attempted murder. Mary Warren informs the Proctors’ that Elizabeth’s name has been mentioned in court. Elizabeth immediately knew who it was accusing her. She even goes on to say that “she wants me dead john you know it.”(Miller 170) Both Elizabeth and John Proctor knew who “she” was, it was Abigail Williams. Elizabeth had already found out about the Ms. Williams and John Proctor’s affair. She knew Abigail Williams wanted her husband, John Proctor. And she realized that Jealousy had gotten the best of her. She was going stop at almost nothing to be with her “true love”, John
The first reason Abigail is to blame for the deaths of the innocent Puritans is her lustful personal ambition to be John Proctor’s wife. John and Abigail previously had an affair, which basically began the hysteria. An exasperated John attempted to tell Abigail the affair is a thing of the past, by saying, “Abby, I may think of you softly from time to time. But I will cut off my hand before I’ll ever reach for you again.” Abigail, however, relentlessly strives to keep their “romance” alive. Because of this intense jealousy of John’s wife, there is an enormous amount of tension between Abigail Williams and Elizabeth Proctor. Abigail even goes as far as to consume a potion with the intent to murder Elizabeth, which Betty confronts her about by saying, “You drank a charm to kill John Proctor’s wife! You drank a charm to kill Goody Proctor!” Abigail is so envious of Elizabeth, she does the unthinkable by accusing her of witchcraft. She claims that Goody Proctor’s spirit came to her and stabbed her with a needle. She felt that if she could dispose of Elizabeth Proctor, she could take her rightful position as John’s wife.
Abigail asks Tituba to help her cast a love spell on John Proctor. Abigail tells the girls who were also involved to keep quiet. Mary Warren begins to feel guilty and tries to persuade the girls to tell the truth. Abigail disagrees with Mary and browbeats the girls “Let either of you breathe a word, or the edge of a word, about the other things… I will bring a pointy reckoning and shutter you”. (Miller 1137) Abigail is threatening the girls that if they say anything about her drinking blood she will harm them. Abigail threatens the girls for her own selfish reasons, Abigail Williams is a villain because she would rather lie and hurt people than tell the truth.
Miller presents the character of John Proctor in an important way to show two sides to his character. These qualities make him have the most important role in ‘The Crucible.’ The key events that show him in this way is when the audience find out about the affair, how he tries to defend his wife, his confession in court and his hanging for the sake of others. Through the events in The Crucible, Miller then portrays John Proctor’s character with tension and suspense. This then makes the audience question whether or not he is a good man.
Corruption has always existed in our society since the beginning to present time due to conspiracies such as the witch trials and the communism era. The Crucible by Arthur Miller was written during the era of communism to mere the hysteria. The Crucible is about the Salem witch trials in Salem Massachusetts in 1692. It’s a corrupt witch trial in Salem that’s due to false accusations of witchcraft for personal gains. John Proctor is the protagonist in the story The Crucible who goes through the ultimate test by choosing his reputation over integrity. He also had an affair with a young girl named Abigail who is the antagonist and is the main reason the bloodshed is occurring in Salem. Initially, Proctor hesitates to deal with his sin, but as the play progresses, he begins to understand its effects; this ultimately leads him to find goodness in himself as he stands for the truth.
Throughout the many acts of the play, we sense the anger rolling off Abigail’s words. “I never knew what pretense Salem was, I never knew the lying lessons I was taught by all these Christian women and their covenanted men! And now you bid me tear the light out of my eyes? I will not, I cannot! You loved me, John Proctor, and whatever sin it is, you love me yet!” By these words, we know that Abigail Williams is angry. She’s angry at John Proctor for trying to hide the crime he committed with her, and for the lack of closure she
In every conflict there always seems to be at least one person to blame. In The Crucible by Arthur Miller, many problems arise that deal with live and death. Many innocent people in this play were hanged during the Salem Witch Trials. Of course, there are many people that may be blamed. In The Crucible, one may find Abigail Williams, The Putnams, and Mary Warren to blame. Abigail was manipulative, The Putnams were very jealous, and Mary Warren was weak-willed.
The Crucible is a famous play written by Arthur Miller. This play centers around the witch trials that took place in Salem, Massachusetts. In Act II, Abigail and her friends accuse several innocent people of witchcraft. Once they leave the court, Reverend Hale goes to John Proctor’s house to inform Elizabeth Proctor that people in the court have mentioned her name. Then officials of the court, Herrick and Cheever, arrive at the Proctor’s house. They claim to have a warrant for Elizabeth’s arrest because the court declares she practices witchcraft. After, Herrick and Cheever take Elizabeth to jail. Injustice in Act II prevails because of the inability to see the truth. Reverend Hale and John Proctor illuminate the theme that closed-mindedness
Another important work Miller wrote, The Crucible, takes place in Salem, Massachusetts, during the 17th century. It is a time when jealousy and suspicion poisoned the thinking of an entire town. Neighbor turned against neighbor when events happened that could not be explained. Accusations turned into a mad hunt for witches who did not exist. One of the main characters of the play is John Proctor, a well-respected man with a good name in the town. As the play develops, John Proctor’s moral dilemma becomes evident: he must decide whether to lie and confess to witchcraft in order to save his life, or to die an honest man, true to his beliefs.
Arthur Miller’s dramatic play The Crucible, takes place during 1692 in Salem, Massachusetts. The setting is important because it takes place during the time of the Salem Witch Trials. The play begins with the town’s girls, led by Abigail Williams, gathering in the forest and starting to dance around a fire, chanting. Reverend Parris catches them dancing, sending the girls into a panic and causing two of the girls to go into a coma-like state. The townspeople spread rumors that there are witches lurking throughout the the town that have put the girls under their spells. This causes Reverend Parris to send for Reverend Hale, an expert in witchcraft and the devil's work, who hopes to rid the town of all witchcraft. John Proctor, a local farmer, asks Abigail to stop accusing innocent people and start telling the truth about what happened in the forest. Elizabeth Proctor, John Proctor's wife, excused Abigail from their house because she found out about an affair between Abigail and John. She lies to the court when she is asked about John’s affair to save him from any punishment. In doing so, they were both sent to jail for witchcraft because they knew she had lied. Abigail and the girls continued to lie about people in the town being witches, causing many innocent people to be killed, including John Proctor. Miller shows the dangers of scapegoating when lies that are regarded as the truth, and can kill innocent characters.
In the play that dramatized the absurdity of the American court system and how hysteria could take toll on an entire town, Arthur Miller’s The Crucible showed just how chaotically a seemingly perfect society could come instantly unglued. Miller’s choice of representing the Salem witch trials as play that symbolized the idiocy of the more recent ideology, McCarthyism, made the play a theatrical classic. Miller showed that people are strongly motivated to lie, by the power of jealousy, to see through a personal vendetta.
The Crucible is a 1953 play by Arthur Miller. Initially, it was known as The Chronicles of Sarah Good. The Crucible was set in the Puritan town of Salem, Massachusetts. It talks of McCarthyism that happened in the late 1600’s whereby the general public and people like Arthur Miller were tried and persecuted. The Crucible exemplifies persecutions during the Salem Witch Trials. The people were convicted and hung without any tangible proof of committing any crime. Persecutions were the order of the day. When a finger was pointed at any individual as a witch, the Deputy Governor Danforth never looked for evidence against them or evidence that incriminated them; he ordered them to be hanged. This can be seen through his words “Hang them high over the town! Who weeps for those, weeps for corruption!” (1273), the people were persecuted aimlessly. The four main characters in the play, John Proctor, Abigail Adams, Reverend Hale and Reverend Parris, are caught in the middle of the witchcraft panic in the religious Salem, Massachusetts in late 1690’s. Persecution is the most important theme in the Crucible, the leaders and citizens of Salem attacks and persecutes one of their own without any tangible evidence against them.
From the start of the play, Abigail already has a bad reputation for committing adultery. Elizabeth Proctor had kicked her out of their home because Elizabeth knew of the affair that was going on between Abigail and John. This tarnished her reputation and for that, Abigail wanted to get revenge on Elizabeth Proctor. “She is blackening my name in the village! She is telling lies about me! She is a cold, sniveling woman, and you bend to her!” This is the remark Abigail makes to John Proctor about Elizabeth and what she is doing to her reputation. The main reason behind Abigail accusing so many people is so that eventually the blame is put on Elizabeth. Abigail’s hopes are to have Elizabeth killed so her and John can go on living their lives together. Not only does she want to live her life with John Proctor, but Abigail is also angered at Elizabeth because of the reputation she has given her throughout the village. Her actions go to show how willing she is to ruin numerous lives in order to get revenge on Elizabeth and also get rid of Elizabeth to carry on her dreams of marrying John Proctor. Obviously, Abigail Williams was very serious about getting vengeance on Elizabeth for destroying her reputation in the village of Salem,
The characters of Abigail, Reverend Parris, Danforth, Mary Warren, and Thomas Putnam, illustrate the moral corruption and hypocrisy at the heart of Salem’s society and witch trials. Abigail realizes that she has power and, “turned her own violation of Salem law into a occasion for naming those for whom she has little liking and, in so doing transforms herself into a local heroine” (Schlueter and Flanagan 116). Abigail really wants revenge on Elizabeth Proctor and will do anything to have her killed so she can be with John again. One of the reasons Abigail doesn't want to confess is because if the people found out she wanted to cast spells against Elizabeth, they would realize she had an affair with John Proctor and think she interacted with the devil. Proctor brings the past affair into court and says, “She thinks to dance with me on my wife’s grave!” (Miller 116). Elizabeth was only one of many people she tried to have killed. The finger pointing from Abigail was used to get the attention of dancing in the woods out of her hands. Reverend Parris also displays moral corruption and hypocrisy in the story. Parris is a selfish liar who only
The crucible is a very popular novel/play written by Arthur Miller. John and Elizabeth Proctor are a basic couple who deal with difficult situations. John remains somewhat static throughout most of the play. Elizabeth sees Abigail as a threat during the entire story as she
The true antagonist of the play is the town of Salem itself, because of the judgemental and self concerned peoples, and its oppressive views. Abigail;s outrageous actions are due to her desensitized views on death and actions otherwise viewed as unethical. From her youth ABigail recalls: “ I saw indians smash my dear parents’ head on the pillow next to mine and i have seen some reddish work at night” (Miller 20), because of this Abigail is numb to death and suffering and is in fact quite morbid. There is no problem in condemning other to death in Abigail’s eyes because she doesn’t see the issue with it. Abigail does not seem to comprehend that it is unethical to let people be hanged and stoned to death and has no issue telling others that she “ can make you wish you had never seen the sun go down” (Miller 20). Not only is Abigail desensitized to murder and death, she is also numb to other unethical dilemmas. Abigail is desensitized to corrupting the Proctor’s marriage because of her childish lust and obsession for John Proctor. Such desires can be seen through her encounters with Proctor. In regards to their so called “relationship” she says: “it’s she put me out, you cannot pretend it were you. I saw your face when she put me out, and you loved me then and you love me now!” (Miller 22). Abigail does not view her behavior t...