Fear often leads people to make rash, harmful mistakes. This emotion is to be afraid of (someone or something) likely to be dangerous, painful, or threatening. The Crucible is based on the Salem witch trials of 1692. A bunch of girls claim they are corrupted by the devil and accused many of witchcraft to get out of trouble because they were caught dancing in the forest by a fire which is forbidden. Fear is the reason why the village of Salem dealt with the witchcraft incidents so badly. Throughout the trials of the people living in Salem no evidence was found to convict anyone of witchcraft. Instead the word of a group of young girls was taken as the truth. As the play develops, Miller shows us how fear increases and destroys the community. Abigail Williams was one of the main accusers in the Salem Witch trials. She is the 11-year-old niece of Reverend Samuel Parris who was one of the girls caught dancing dancing naked in the forest with animal blood and a cauldron. People who do things like this in there village are labeled witches and killed. So Abigail is pretty scared from the beginning, and starts the finger pointing to defend herself starting this witch trial. She is in love with a man in her village named John Proctor, realizing she will never have him due to his love for his …show more content…
He is respected by many people who live in his village. But he had a past affair with his servant Abigail Williams. His wife, Elizabeth is very forgiving of his sin, but John has his mind set that he will not confess to anyone else, in fear of ruining his good name and reputation. He also fears that his wife will be hanged due to the accusations Abigail has made about her in the court of being a witch. John would rather die knowing that he did not give in, and that he stood up for what he knew to be true. He was a man of pride, and has the qualities of honesty, and
In The Crucible, Aurthur Miller illustrates, and suggests how fear of losing someone leads to atrocious and vicious acts. It all starts when Abigail gets caught for performing witchcraft. In this time Salem was Puritan, they were full of fear in the devil, and would kill anyone who was apart of it. Abigail's behavior in the woods lead her to be scared of the other girls she was with to betray her and her name being blackened.
How can fear alter the choices people make? In The Crucible by Arthur Miller, a town called Salem is thought to be filled with witches. The suspicion started when a group of girls were caught dancing in the woods, and a few mysteriously became sick. After the townsfolk became hysterical and accused each other of performing witchcraft, which was punishable by death if they did not confess. Fear and self-interest caused characters to betray fellow citizens in order to preserve their own lives.
The crucible was a play written in 1953 by Arthur Miller speaking on witch trials of salem in Massachusetts. The play is about a girl named abigail williams who falls in love with a man named john proctor who happens to be married. Abigail is is made out to be the leader of a group of girls caught up in these witch trials. Arthur miller tries his best to portray the emotions actions and feelings of these caught up in the drama of these trials. Abigail Williams started as the first of many of the accused of witchcraft.
The town of Salem was in a hysterical state. Citizens, gullible to the word of a young girl of seventeen, were in a panic. Like the citizens of the town, the court clutched to any word stated from any individual in the town. It was the word of witchcraft. The court picked off innocent people like flies in the suspicion that they been involved with some evil satanic power, and in an attempt to save themselves, they confessed to a lie, that they have committed witchcraft and pacted with the devil.
Ever since the beginning of time people have been afraid of the unknown. This is because every time something new appears people immediately try to disregard it, making themselves open to ignorance. This is exactly what happens in Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible”, when people started accusing each other of witchcraft. Because of the factors of the unknown the people of Salem are strucken of fear because they are afraid to go against what the majority says thus, making people unreasonable and brings misjustice to the accused. To begin, John Proctor tries to go against the flow of the river, by attempting to reason with the people of Salem.
Without the vengeful seventeen year old girl, Abigail Williams, the chaos that occurs in the small town of Salem would dissipate. While living in a Puritan society and having to move in with her uncle having fun was definitely not a top priority, but in Abigail's mind it was. In 1692, a small Puritan town known as Salem, Massachusetts youngs girls are about to face the death trial for dabbling in witchcraft. Abigail Williams, along with five other girls and her family’s slave Tituba, were caught dancing in the woods by her “perfect” uncle Reverend Parris. The next day Parris’s daughter who was also in the woods the night before will not wake up.
In The Crucible, Arthur Miller leaves readers wondering if fear and pride can have a fatal partnership. He uses the opposing forces, the court and the accused, to display how the pride of the judges cost many of the accused their lives. Throughout The Crucible, readers are shown that the pride of the court feeds into the fear of witchcraft all throughout Salem. For instance, Hale, who is a well-educated man, thinks he is above being at fault. As a result, he wrongfully sends many citizens off to their deaths.
When people are placed under an intense feeling of fear, they begin to commit actions they never thought they were capable over. In The Crucible by Arthur Miller, a young group of girls commit witchcraft which eventually leads to the arrest of over 100 women. This is similar to a time in the 1950s when Joseph McCarthy accuses government officials of communism and that ultimately leads to hundreds of citizens losing their jobs. The Crucible reveals the similarities between The Salem Witch Trials of the 1690s and McCarthyism of the 1950s because it demonstrates how a society can be tremendously impacted by the feeling the fear.
The Crucible, written by Arthur Miller in 1953, is an allegory that reflects the influence of McCarthyism and the events that took place during Miller’s experience with the House Un-American Activities Committee. In the 1950s, Senator Joseph Mccarthy believed that there were communist spies within America that needed to be investigated and jailed by an organization, HUAC, and to name names. The House Un-American Activities Committee is an organization that sought to expel suspected communists from American society in the late 40s and early 50s, influenced by McCarthy indirectly. This group can be seen as the puritan court in The Crucible which made similar prosecutions to townsfolk in the play by investigating the accused for witchcraft.
What is fear? Fear is an unpleasant emotion caused by the belief of someone or something is dangerous, likely to cause pain or threat. In my own words fear is a feeling people get when someone is going to kill them. But not all fear is bad because some people feel fear differently How is fear used in “The Crucible” ?
In a small village called Salem, witchcraft and sorcery exist, however everyone is pointing fingers but not a single soul knows who is actually to blame for this nonsense. During this time period of hysteria, there are multiple scenes that are very questionable due to one person and one person only. Abigail is the one most responsible for the hysteria and witchcraft in Salem. She threatens the group of girls that accompanied her in the woods while they all danced. She has also lied about many things on multiple occasions in which causes an extreme amount of suspicion.
The play, The Crucible, written by Arthur Miller demonstrates the implications of a society in complete chaos over an irrational fear of witchcraft in the town of Salem, Massachusetts. Fear plays an immense role in the way people make their decisions, such as when the characters of Danforth and Mary Warren resort to hypocrisy when no other options remain. Danforth and Mary Warren both embody hypocrisy, as seen when Mary says she cannot lie anymore and then lies when she becomes scared for her life, and Danforth when saying lying will send a person to Hell, but then forcing people to choose between lying and death. Mary Warren exemplifies hypocrisy extraordinarily well in the scene when she and Proctor travel to the courthouse so she can confess that the girls have pretended everything and they never actually saw spirits.
The Crucible: How Fear Changes People During his first Inaugural Address, Franklin D. Roosevelt once announced, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself”. Fear manipulates a persons rationality resulting in them behaving in ways they normally would not, especially in the story The Crucible written by Arthur Miller. The characters in The Crucible allow fear to manipulate their beliefs and actions. They all know what is right, but fear alters their mindset causing them to act differently.
An opinion formed or a decision reached in the case of a disputed, controversial or doubtful matter. That is judgment. Judgment is the basis for much of a Puritan society. Within this society, truth has no meaning. This is because, as a community, people choose to believe only what they want to believe.
Between the years 1692 and 1693, more than 200 people were accused of witchcraft and 20 were executed from those false accusations in Salem alone. Although there were no actual witches, this was the result of all the chaos and paranoia. Arthur Miller, the author of The Crucible, wrote about the tragedy of Salem and how deception and extreme hysteria tore the town to pieces. Arthur Miller wrote about how Tituba confessed to have affiliations with the devil and from her confession, many others felt as it was imperative to confess and accuse other people to save their own life which led to many more inaccurate claims. In The Crucible, Miller uses motifs to demonstrate how the idea of witchcraft that spread throughout Salem caused panic and chaos among the townspeople.