The Crucible is a complex and intriguing novel with events, characters and themes comparable to almost every period of human history. It is common for humans to fear change and what is unknown, in the play The Crucible this is witchcraft and the devil, in more recent times it can be seen in post World War Two and Cold War United States, through McCarthyism. The themes in the crucible are as important to people in the 21st century as in Salem in 1692. These include justice, reputation, hysteria, intolerance and empowerment. All of these are common themes throughout human history. The characters in The Crucible are also important to people of the 21st century as they can teach us a little bit about people around us and their reactions when …show more content…
Reputation shines as a theme in the play. Through reputation comes discrimination and in the crucible almost all the witches are judged on reputation and this is important in today's world especially with things such as racism. Another critical theme in The Crucible is the role that hysteria can play in tearing apart a community. Hysteria messes with logic and enables people to believe that their neighbors, whom they have always considered upstanding people, are committing unbelievable crimes. Intolerance is key in the crucible. Because Salem is a theocratic society, moral and state laws are the same and therefore there is no room for error and intolerance becomes current. Danforth shows this when in Act III he says "a person is either with this court or he must be counted against it." Empowerment is central in modern day society and appears in The Crucible many times. The play shows how power corrupts and how certain characters use there power in association with fear, to get there way. The characters in Arthur millers The Crucible can teach a lot about people. People can be horrible and terribly deceptive. When placed under pressures and after experiencing trauma peoples real character can come out. In the case of The Crucible Abigail is shown for what she really is. She gets a kind of power and this corrupts her to use the situation to have Elizabeth Proctor sent to jail. Abigail is not the only one who takes advantage of the
“The Crucible” was a play, which demonstrated the order of human mentality when falling into fear. This comes from the extreme behavior found in response to the Salem witch trials. The Salem witch trials in this play have demonstrated the hidden desires or true thought coming from people. The limitations to prospective actions slowly become narrower as time progresses throughout the storyline and can relate to how the author was facing as well with the fear of neo-Nazis and the affiliation with people which terrorized America. This is connected to how Americans treat the current country and how the people in the town treated each other. The relation is uncanny to present day
In The Crucible society affected the way everyone lived by their religions. Anyone who did certain things back then people thought were the doings of witchcraft. This restricted people from living certain ways because if they did they would be accused of witchcraft. Therefore not everyone could live the way they wanted too. Everyone was restricted by the laws of society. The Crucible can relate to today’s society because nowadays a lot of the time if you are accused of something you can be convicted and
The Crucible not only has witches and delusional people but also universal conflicts that apply in the 17th, 20th, and 21st century. The spread of the hysteria throughout Salem was thanks to the citizens dire need of revenge. Then the next problem comes- who do you trust? There’s no bigger person just the 1st one to do wrong and then the 2nd. The Crucible still is relevant to us today because people are always put in situations where they must choose revenge or trust.
The Crucible, a play, by American playwright Arthur Miller, is set in the small New England town of Salem Massachusetts in 1992. The play opens with Reverend Parris praying beside his daughter Betty Parris 's bed. In the bed Betty lies in some sort of paralyzed state. The town 's doctor, Doctor Griggs, does not know of a medicine to cure Betty’s symptoms and advises Reverend Parris to consider unnatural causes. It becomes rumored among the townspeople of Salem that Betty has fallen victim to witchcraft, because of this Parris requests that Reverend John Hale of Beverly, an expert on witchcraft, examines Betty to confirm the rumor that she is bewitched.
The crucible is a play where the small town goes into the witch trials. This happened because some girls were caught dancing in the woods with a black slave named Tituba. After this people started to blame the girls for being devil worshippers. There are a bunch of tirls that went on during this time and neighbors turned on each other and so did friends. Because of the witch trials many innocent women and fellas died. This story was all about how the town of Salem feared the devil and felt threatened by the wilderness. In the crucible individuals are trying to convince society of the truth. Example Giles Coreys wife gets accused of witch craft because she reads a lot. The reverened has her arrested then she has to face trial. John Proctor and
The Crucible is a book about the salem witch trials on the surface, but in reality it is so much more than that. In this book Arthur Miller makes historical references like the Red Scare and the hysteria of communism, as well as in the book the hysteria is about witches. He also makes some biblical comparisons in the book. The characters are very complex just like the book, knowing this, let's dive in. In The Crucible there is an ongoing hysteria of witches in Salem. This is all because one girl named Abigail Williams decides to make accusations when she lusts for a man named John Proctor and in an effort to get closer to him she tries to get rid of his wife. In the book the reason for everything that she's doing is her lust for John. In
The Crucible, a play written by Arthur Miller, is based in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692. Salem, a small village, was a hotspot of mass hysteria and paranoia. In The Crucible, Arthur Miller shows that in the Salem witch trials, for many people fear is a greater motivator than morality. Fear is caused by the threat of danger, pain or harm and morality is the principles concerning write or wrong. In The Crucible,The characters that put morality above fear turn out to be a victim of unjustness because for many characters, the threat of witches and the pain and harm of the loss of loved ones is more of a motivator than truth, respect and justice.
In The Crucible, Arthur Miller uses the setting of Puritan Salem, the twisting plot, and developing characterization to propel the play. Arthur Miller takes advantage of the mindset of villagers in Salem at the time. For instance, there was a pressure to be perfect, to never be caught doing anything the reverend wouldn’t approve of. Every action was closely monitored by your neighbors and any other bystander at the time. Next, plot comes into the play by developing a sense of background and history between the characters by using jealousy, fear, and mass hysteria. An example of this would be the jealousy of Abigail Williams. Fear and mass hysteria were brought into play because of the fact that this was the villagers only chance to seek revenge
Today I went into town in order to see what all this witchcraft commotion was all about. According to Reverend Parris his daughter, Betty, has been bewitched. All this sounds a bit crazy to me because the details do not add up. I see Abigail and hope not to make conversation with her, but eventually I am alone with her and she explains everything to me. She begins by declaring her love for me and how much she misses me and does not go a day without thinking about me. She then tells me that all the witchcraft talk is nonsense and that Betty is just faking it. Abigail tells me that she and a group of friends went into the woods and danced around the fire. I was so shocked because dancing is a bad thing, I believe they
“The Crucible” was written during the time of the Cold War. America was not only fighting a silent war with Russia, but an internal one with itself. There was a large scare of finding communists on American soil, and it scared the US population. “The Crucible” is an account of the Salem Witch Trials, which was a scare in the early years of America in search of witches. The reason the author wrote the play was to compare the two events and to show how the Communist hunt was like the witch hunt in the sense of how it is
No matter what you assert, Abigail will turn the situation around so it seems like she is the victim. Arthur Miller was born in Harlem, New York. The Crucible is a play based during the Salem witch trials that took place in the Massachusetts. In the town of Salem, Massachusetts, adolescent girls are deceiving the town. When this untruth goes too far many lives are endangered. One would view this play because of the the emotional dogfight. In The Crucible, Arthur Miller uses detail to reveal theme.
As one of the first plays I have ever experienced at the Lied Center and in the thrust stage style Abigail/1702 was a unique experience. On October 8th, a Sunday, I went and saw this theater production. The play was produced by the Nebraska Repertory Theatre and directed by Andy Park. It was originally written by Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa under the premise of what could have happened to Abigail from The Crucible. Overall I thought the play had a unique perspective on what it is like to live with guilt and what it takes to forgive yourself. I think it also added dimension to why certain things took place in The Crucible and how it affected those involved.
“The Crucible” is written by Arthur Miller, and it is about a very religious community in Salem, Massachusetts. The book is about a group of girls that went into the forest and “talked to the devil.” In the forest they performed some kind of a ritual and some negative effects, consequently two girls were under the wrath of witchcraft, unable to awake. In the play, "The Crucible," characters are placed in intense circumstances where they feel uncomfortable and they requirement for something to change with a specific end goal to determine the issue. One of the two classes of individuals must change with a specific end goal to determine the contention, and three fundamental characters show power and change more than any others. Reverend Parris,
The Crucible by Arthur Miller is a fantastic representation of events that occurred in 1692 in Salem, Massachusetts. These events were infamous for a variety of reasons, one being that many citizens were executed on the charge of being a witch. Another reason the Salem Witch Trials were so infuriating and ridiculous is because witches don’t actually exist. The play represents the fear of the unknown and was very relevant the time in which it was written. However the fear of the unknown wasn’t the only reason for the start of the Salem Witch Trials. Superstition, Vengeance, and Theocracy are some of the driving forces behind many hateful and outlandish acts portrayed in The Crucible. These themes were much more prevalent back then than they are now, but they still had a heavy impact on puritan society at the time. However these themes will exist as long as humans exist, because actions like the ones taken in the story only portray human instincts that will never go away. The Crucible was not only about the Salem Witch Trials, but human behavior as a whole.
In “The Crucible,” Arthur Miller takes the reader on a journey back in time to witness the widespread hysteria that struck Salem, Massachusettes in 1692. Miller's inspiration for writing The Crucible came from the events surrounding the McCarthy trials and their similarity to the historical Salem Witch Trials. During the hearings, many women and some men, are put to death after being falsely accused of witchcraft. Young girls and a slave from the Puritan community are caught dancing in the late of the night in the woods. Fearing punishment, after seeing Tituba, the slave, being tortured and falsely confess, the girls, admit as well. During the Seventeenth Century, the government was heavily influenced by the church, and there had been widespread witch hunts in England in the recent past. Consequently, the fear of witchcraft was alive and fear by many in the Puritan church. In the end, the girls accused innocent people; with ulterior motives at play be it old grudges of their parents or dislikes of their own nineteen people lost their lives to the hysteria. Miller, being a young adult and playwright in the 1940s and 50s was targeted by the McCarthyism movement and ultimately blacklisted due to his non-cooperation, which in turn provoked the writing of The Crucible.