Mass Hysteria In The Crucible By Arthur Miller

Through their reactions to the witch trials, characters in Arthur Miller’s The Crucible portray two major themes of self-preservation and mass hysteria. The play is set in Puritan Society in the late 1600’s in Salem, where most people are devout Christians and hold a strong belief of both God and the Devil. Through Abigail’s and Tituba’s actions of self-protection at the expense of others, Miller reveals the dangers of mass hysteria and its motivation towards self-preservation and false accusations. Abigail essentially begins the hysteria in Salem when she verifies the false suspicions of witchcraft, she then tells Reverend Hale that Tituba made her drink blood in order to draw the attention away from herself. Abigail points her finger at

Mass Hysteria In the book “The Crucible” by Arthur Miller, the characters were strong believers of witches and witchcraft. What started off as a little lie, grew way out of portion, which can be blamed on a few specific characters. They caused the death of many innocent people that were falsely accused of being witches/doing witchcraft and/or working with the devil. The first major one being Abigail, she single handedly made all of the children afraid to speak about what happened in the woods.

“Going to the darkest place you can to make yourself really upset and adding that with the physicality and running around, you can work yourself into hysteria .” American actress Alexandra Daddario said this while her life seemed unorthodox. Mass Hysteria is a phenomenon that transmits collective illusions of threats, whether real or imaginary, through a population in society as a result of rumors and fear. In Arthur Miller's drama, The Crucible, Mass Hysteria is tremendously recognized. The play takes place in the late 1600’s in the small village of Salem, Massachusetts where over 100 people are accused of performing witchcraft.

Fear in The Crucible Fear plays an important role in the play The Crucible, written by Arthur Miller. Fear motivated the accusers and accused in the play like Abigail Williams, John Proctor, and Mary Warren. Abigail Williams was really scared in the beginning of the play because she was drinking blood in the woods well all the other girls watched and danced. Another one of her fear was getting convicted by the court so she kept lying to the court so she would not get in trouble.

Puritans are people of deep religious values and in Salem, Massachusetts; they are confounded when the news of witchcraft breaks air around the town. In The Crucible, by Arthur Miller, people began to have delirium and hysteria because of the witch trials. The author portrayed these trials from the chaos in the United States and his colleagues to depict the turmoil in Salem. In Arthur Miller’s book grudge and personal rivalries cause hysteria and delirium of witches, which forced fallouts and deaths in the town. Miller uses grudges and personal rivalries as energy that kept the witch trials going.

Fear—“a darkroom where negatives develop”(Asif). People in history are bound by fear, so great that it causes mass hysterias. As portrayed in Arthur Miller's The Crucible, the Salem Witch Trials brought fear to everyone of being accused of being a witch. Everyone is afraid of being accused of being a witch, so people started to accuse each other. Just like the hysteria in the Salem Witch Trials, the September Eleventh event occurred when a plane crashed into the Twin Towers by Muslim hijackers.

Reader’s Response Act 2 In reading act two of The Crucible, we discover the important role power plays in the lives of John Proctor and Abigail Williams when rumors of witchcraft continue spreading. John Proctor is known as a prominent landholder and farmer in the community of Salem, whereas Abigail is Reverend Parris’ niece and a former servant for the Proctors. I believe Proctor is in a difficult position because he knows he can stop Abigail’s accusations, but not without the whole town finding out about his affair. When act two begins, Proctor comes to the realization that Abigail has taken over the town of Salem and she’s gaining power.

Fear feeds fear. The play The Crucible and the opinion editorial “Nature Isn’t on a Rampage. That Would Be Us” both address the topic of collective hysteria. Both of these texts exemplify how fear in individuals can breed mass hysteria in the collective, and when the collective falls into mass hysteria, people are blinded from the truth.

Throughout the town of Salem, Massachusetts fear has spread. It has affected everyone in the town and has brought nothing but chaos. The people of Salem are becoming more scared and determined to hunt down every witch they can find. In The Crucible, fear is appeared as a negative trait since it makes the people act differently during this period of time. Abigail showed fear when she said that Tituba was a witch and was performing witchcraft.

In Salem, Massachusetts, in the time of 1692, mass hysteria was created around witches and the idea of the devil being alive in Salem. Salem was a theocratic society meaning that its government is controlled by religious beliefs and practices. As a result of this government, and the era this story takes place, Men took a more commanding role in society. The men took care of the land, and their livestock, and were tasked by God to provide for their families. On the other hand, women in this age took a more quiet role in society.

In the overture of The Crucible, Arthur Miller characterizes the Puritans as hardworking, yet emphasizes their many negative traits to analyze the type of environment necessary to produce mass hysteria. While no one truly knew what the lives of the Puritans were like, the Puritans were feared greatly because their society was seen as "a barbaric frontier inhabited by a sect of fanatics..." Everyone viewed the Puritans as fanatics because they often minded other people 's business. This, consequently, created suspicion, eventually leading to the Salem Witch Trials. The Salem Witch Trials took place during a period of utter fear and chaos, where many were afraid that individuality was on the rise.

In this world, it is not the gentle rain that people will listen to, but thunder and lightning. The storm is what catches people’s attention, and it is the storm that is used by individuals to make others look at them. In my opinion, hysteria is a man-made storm prevalent throughout all of human history. People will use this hysteria for two major reasons, to gain power in the world, or to create change in it.

After the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Americans were fearful of further Japanese attacks on the West Coast and also of Japanese Americans. In response to this fear, President Roosevelt passed an executive order relocating all people of Japanese descent from the West Coast inland. Similar to the fear of the American people, the witch hunts in the novel The Crucible by Arthur Miller led people to believe that girls in the town were being bewitched. Mass hysteria caused multiple arrests for accusations and even death for the so called “witches”. The theme of fear in both the Crucible and the Japanese Internment Camps of WWII caused people to be easily persuaded with the use of pathos and logos.

Is the death of seven children justification enough to take part in the murders of more than a dozen innocent people? When Ann Putnam, one of the main antagonists in The Crucible, a play by Arthur Miller, accuses Rebecca Nurse of practicing witchcraft, is this an act of pure insanity or calculated revenge fueled by jealousy? Throughout the play, it is evident that Ann Putnam, who has mysteriously lost seven children, is in denial about her babies’ death and desperate to hold anyone accountable other than herself. She cannot handle the death of her several children being a case of god's will, and so has to something to fill the void. Therefore, she turns to Rebecca Nurse because she helped birth all of Mrs. Putmans babies, who all but one,

The Crucible written by Arthur Miller. The Crucible is a story based off of a lot of main characters and scenes. The story itself is based off the salem witch trials hence the story is in the town of salem. The three categories of this story was mass hysteria where people believe things and all join in. Group think is how people together make decisions based on ideas in the group.