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Exclusion of The Crucible Act Ⅱ Scene 2 Essay

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In Act Ⅱ Scene 2 of The Crucible, a 1953 play by the Arthur Miller, Abigail Williams, the antagonist, meets John Proctor, the protagonist, in the forest at night, where John asks Abigail to free his wife in court the next day, or otherwise he will expose their affair in public to ruin her. This fast-paced short scene portrays Abigail as pious and possessed, which contradicts the impression given by previous scenes. Most importantly, the scene reveals the crucial plan of Proctor which he is planning to use to take down Abigail. By excluding the scene, Miller eliminates the unfavourable danger of jeopardizing the credibility of the characters due to the inconsistency of descriptions, heightens the dramatic effect when Proctor confesses in …show more content…

Compared to Act IV, Proctor is strangely more concerned with his own name! He says, "How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul; leave me my name!" (Book pg. 240). Now, do you not think the play with the scene included will confuse the readers and even force them into considering Abigail, instead of a girl who has “an endless capacity for dissembling”(Book pg.169), as a insane girl who is lost in this ongoing hysteria and Proctor, instead of a heroic protagonist, as a cowardly hypocrite who cannot even keep what he says straight? How do you feel when a random guy shout out the ending during a movie? Well, if I were you, I will be very pissed. Amazingly, Act Ⅱ Scene Ⅱ is the “random guy”. By the end, Proctor unveils his master plan to Abigail, “I will make you famous for the whore you are!”(Page 4). This definitely lays a solid foundation for the readers to deduce the ending of the play, either Abigail exonerating his wife or Proctor confessing the ugly truth. Either way, it will make the confession in Act Ⅳ easily anticipated and less dramatic. There is no doubt that Arthur Miller wants any of this to happen. From another perspective, it also implies that the flawless and persuasive performance Abigail gives in court in Act Ⅲ is well prepared beforehand; however if the scene is left out, it will strengthen Abigail’s prowess at affectation and makes it more believable to the

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