Jack Del Giudice
Mrs. Schmiedeler
English 2F
21 October 2015
Crucible Essay
“It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation, and only one bad one to lose it.” This is a quote by Benjamin Franklin and it explains how the puritan society in The Crucible work. this quote shows how fragile a reputation can be, you can spend your whole life increasing your reputation, but one wrong move and it’s completely wrong. In The Crucible, many of Arthur Miller’s characters are very concerned with their reputation. In early American Puritan society reputation was one the most important values in their community, which leads to many characters that overvalue their reputation. Characters in this play become so obsessed their reputation that it causes
…show more content…
(Miller 122) The confession would be hung on the church door for all to see and his reputation would be ruined. Proctor attempted to save lives by telling the court the truth, but he failed. He sees his friends and neighbors hung nobly and decides to not live with the guilt of lying and decides to die and wants to be remembered as the man he was not a coward. Reverend Parris will do anything in his power to save his reputation. He is known as the reverend of the church which is a very high position in a Puritan society. A lot of citizens do not agree with the way he teaches in the church including John Proctor. Reverend Parris reveals how much his reputation mean to him when he says, “Abigail, I have fought here three long years to bend these stiff-necked people to me.”(11). In this quote Parris is talking about how much time he has put into his reputation and that now Abigail is taking it all away In the trials, Parris is having internal conflicts about the innocence of many people. He knows he should stand up and say they are innocent, but he also knows if he did he would damage his reputation greatly. During the trials, Parris knows deep down that some of the people are not guilty. Parris has very little respect in the town expect for
Reputation is something that one holds above their head to keep their good name safe. Everyone has their own reputation that they have made up for themselves in their own mind. Not only have they made one up for themselves but others make one for them too. There are several people in the Crucible who value their reputation over the truth. Having a good reputation on one’s name is good in the small town of Salem. It helps to have a good name because it makes people want to help with business. There were three important people in the Crucible who valued their reputation the most, John Proctor, Abigail Williams, and Parris.
How many people have you met in your life that is stronger because of a difficult experience they went through? Most people are because we take these difficult experiences and grow from them and become better people. This is the exact case is expressed in the play, The Crucible, by Arthur Miller. The story begins in Salem, Massachusetts 1692 right in the middle of a period of witchcraft hysteria. During this time many people were accused of being witches and wrongly convicted by judges Danforth and Hathorne. The characters in the story are struggling because of a girl named Abigail who gets caught practicing witchcraft and then starts naming and accusing others so that she doesn’t get in trouble; one of these people being a well-respected farmer, John Proctor’s, wife Elizabeth. The title, The Crucible, refers to a test, trial, ordeal, formation by fire, and vessel baked to resist heat, and the entire story is an allegory meaning it has a hidden meaning. John Proctor symbolizes a crucible by embodying the definition of one, as he went through a test and was formed by fire.
Miller implements the characterization of Reverend Parris to further illustrate the theme of the play. Reverend Parris worries most about how the community views him, and goes to far lengths to keep his image intact. Miller uses Reverend Parris’s dialogue in Act I to demonstrate this when abigail says,“Uncle, the rumor of witchcraft is all about; I think you'd best go down and deny it yourself. The parlor's packed with people, sir – I'll sit with her.
A theme in The Crucible is that a society ruled by theocracy and status based on religion is bound to fall apart. Salem 's strict adherence to the Christian shurch is evident in everything the citizens do. They use measures of a person 's knowledge and adherence to the religion as a means of judging their character and also their status in society. They believe "God [was] provoked so grandly by such a petty cause" (121), which is why the "jails are packed" (121). If the citizen did anything to make God angry, they were punished. This is why the judges were so relentless and naïve in putting the accused women to trial and convicting them. They believed "the law, based upon the Bible, and the Bible, writ by the Almighty God,
Crucible, a noun defined as; a container of metal or refractory material employed for heating substances to high temperatures, in the traditional sense but, it also means a severe, searching test or trial. The latter of the two definitions is exactly what Arthur Miller had in mind when he wrote the play, The Crucible. The play set in Salem Massachusetts during the start of the infamous Salem Witch Trials, is about the struggle to discover truth within the twisted and brutal lies flying about the little town, started mainly by a young girl by the name of Abigail Williams. Abigail Williams, as we quickly come to know, is the past mistress of the prominent Mr. John Proctor, a local farmer. As the tension rises in the
In the play, The Crucible, by Arthur Miller, the people of Salem, Massachusetts prove time and time again that they care more about their reputations than the events that are taking place and how these events are affecting the people around them. Having a good reputation can be a good thing but when being concerned about your reputation clouds your judgement, that is when it becomes a dilemma. In The Crucible, Arthur Miller uses having a good reputation, the character of Parris, and how reputation and The Crucible tie into modern life to enlighten the reader that even though having a good reputation is great, it should not cloud one’s ability to see the harm they are doing to others.
In Arthur Miller’s The Crucible the witch trials in Salem were a devastating time. The entire community was in disorder and chaos because of personal vengeance. This included accusations of innocent town’s people being called witches, so they hanged and were jailed. Throughout the play certain characters help the rise of witchcraft as well as the disapproval of all the innocent people who were being convicted for no reason. Reverend Hale is a dynamic character whom comes to rid of the evil spirits in Salem, yet he later tries to end the trials. Hale realizes the accusations are false, attempts to postpone the hangings, and persuade the victims to lie conveys that he is a dynamic character and changes throughout the play.
Lying leads to terrible tragedies. Lying for so long will make it unpleasant to move on and the more difficult it will become. Just like how The Crucible ends. The Crucible is set in Salem, Massachusetts, at the beginning of the 1692 Salem Witchcraft Trials. The story is centralized around John Proctor, a white, landowning Puritan who betrayed his wife, Elizabeth by having sex with Abigail Williams. Back in the day, everything was black and white, meaning if something isn’t about God then it must’ve been about the Devil, they were religious people and they would not accept the fact that he had sex with someone else outside of marriage. He denied that nothing ever happened between him and Abigail. While Proctor is not taking responsibility for his actions, he causes a big commotion: people getting arrested and hanged, Abigail and a group of other girls are being accused of being part of Witchcraft. In the fourth act, Proctor is stuck in a situation where he either says the truth about who is part of witchcraft or he gets hanged. Proctor does not confess because he does not want people to use his name in vain and he knows that if he confesses it will leave a bad example for his sons, he decided to die an honest man than to live a fraud. At the end, Proctor ripped the confession knowing that he will be hung. Throughout the play, Arthur Miller creates two themes: the past will always haunt you and as people run away from their problems, their problems will continue to follow
If you ask some people what the most important thing in life is, they will say it’s their reputation. Just about every character in the play The Crucible feels that their reputation with the ones they love is more important than even breathing. There is a saying by Benjamin Franklin that relates to this play very well, it states “It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation and only one to destroy it.” This phrase in many ways is very true, especially when reading The Crucible because the
Your reputation is something that affects the way people look at you. A reputation can be viewed by the way you dress, your education level or the people you are associated with. In Arthur Miller's The Crucible many characters are faced with a challenge; they either have to Die to Save the reputation, or live with a broken reputation. Through every action and reaction each character ends up turning the reputation they deserve.
Arthur Miller’s The Crucible is a tragic play set in 1692 in Salem, Massachusetts, where Miller uses the Salem Trials as a metaphor for the 1950s McCarthy hearings. In Salem, people value their good names. The Puritan community acts as a theocracy in which there appears to be no right to privacy, and people must conform to a strict moral code. The theme of reputation, lying, and deceit are shown in Abigail, John Proctor, Elizabeth Proctor, Mary Warren, and other characters. In the play’s dialogue, Miller uses Biblical allusions, situational irony, and dramatic irony to develop these themes.
The small courtroom within the Salem meeting house used for the General court. The witch trials begin with more than 30 women who have already been accused, the hysteria and backstabbing continue to worsen. 1962
The Crucible by Arthur Miller is an interpretation of the Salem witch trials of 1692 in Puritan Massachusetts in which religion, justice, individuality and dignity play a vital role. These factors define the characteristics of many of the most significant characters in the play. Some of them being John Proctor, Rebecca Nurse, Reverend Hale, Danforth and many others. The Salem witch trials were a result of the lack of expression of individuality and the fact that no individual could expect justice from the majority culture as a result of the deterioration of human dignity in the Puritan society of Salem.
In every literary work, there are themes. A theme is a broad idea, moral or message of a book or story. One individual may construe the themes of a book or story differently than another, but that is the pure beauty of themes. One great literary work is The Crucible, a play written by Arthur Miller. Succinctly, the play is about the Salem witch trials that took place in Massachusetts in 1692. Throughout the story, the townspeople indict their neighbors of being a witch and practicing witchcraft. On the surface, this historical drama has a few universal and enduring themes. Themes are universal because regardless of where in the world, the ideas still relates to everyone and is understood. Themes are enduring because the ideas are found
The Crucible by Arthur Miller was a historical fiction play about the prominent Salem Witch Trials. Miller was a well-known American playwright , essayist , and figure on the twentieth American theater. His most popular plays were My son , Death of Salesman , A view From the Bridge , and The Crucible, which is our focus. The Crucible can be defined by saying it was a severe test or trial. The Red Scare was a widespread fear from a society of the rise of communism.