Imagine if today in the law courts, the defendants were always convicted, while all the plaintiffs were always pronounced correct. Many innocent people would be going to prison and serving sentences that they did not deserve! Well that is exactly what went on in Salem, Massachusetts. In The Crucible, there is a large widespread of hysteria due to witchcraft, causing many innocent lives to be taken. All it took was a small group of girls spreading lies about witchcraft to cause chaos throughout Salem, and many other villages. Through multiple characters in this story, Arthur Miller suggests that dishonesty and scapegoating is sometimes more rewarding than honesty. If there is one character who can demonstrate that lying and pointing the finger at others is more rewarding than telling the truth, it is Abigail Williams. Abigail and a group of girls were caught dancing in the forest by Reverend Parris, Abigail’s uncle. Tituba, Parris’s slave, was also there, and it appeared like they were conjuring spirits. A few days after the incident, Abigail was being interrogated by Reverend Hale, a “witch expert”, about what was truly going on. Instead of telling the truth, she pointed straight at Tituba and cried, "She made me do it! (45)”. This is a clear sign of scapegoating, and her dishonesty helped her escape out of a messy situation. As soon as all the eyes are on Abigail and when others are becoming suspicious of her, she points the finger at someone or creates a diversion. In
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.
At the beginning of the play, Abigail Williams lies to avoid trouble. She tries to protect her life over the life of others instead of doing the right thing by being honest about what happened in the woods. She lies multiple times in the play accusing others of witchcraft, although it was false. When the courts put Abigail to the test to see if she tells the truth, she fails and drags most of the town down with her. Unlike Abigail, Elizabeth has always been known for her honesty. Her husband John says that Elizabeth never told a lie. Yet when it matters most, Elizabeth lies to try to save her husband’s life. Ultimately, when Danforth and Hawthorne put her up to the test she fails to tell the truth and kills John. John, attempting to save himself, confesses to witchcraft. He lied to the courts and told them that he indeed was practicing the sorcery, when truthfully he was not. John thinks that this is the right thing to do to save his
"He states that you coldly prompted your daughter to cry witchery upon George Jacobs that is now in jail" (96). In the play The Crucible by Arthur Miller, people would do anything to get what they want. In the town of Salem good vs. evil plays a big role. The people of Salem are constantly debating about who is telling the truth and who is lying. People are also judged based on their religious views. Even though they had a lack of evidence, the town of Salem mislabeled people as good or evil.
In the play The Crucible, the author Arthur Miller displays an unfair treatment of humans when it comes to justice. Characters who live in Salem, Massachusetts, receive improper punishments for their sins of witchcraft and are being accused of crimes they did not commit. The justice system in the play is based on the maxim “guilty until proven innocent” which portrays unjust human rights due to executions of individuals without evidence. The accused characters attempt to defend themselves in court but it is ineffective because the only way to survive is to confess to witchcraft. Miller presents a cruel approach in justice systems and proves them to be unjust through the characters Giles Corey, Tituba, and Rebecca Nurse, who all suffered
The Crucible by Arthur Miller is a historical play set in 1962 in the small town of Salem, Massachusetts. As you may know, you've all placed your trust in the words and actions of someone close to you. And what do they do? They betray you! It's rarely justified, and can happen to the best of us. Based on authentic records of witchcraft trials in the seventeenth-century this play explains how a small group of girls manage to create a massive panic in their town by spreading accusations of witchcraft. These rumors in turn are the causes that many citizens are hung for. This essay will show how the lies and betrayal of a few individuals eventually leads to the downfall of Salem and its society.
In society, we are blind to the lies that are taking place around us every day. Small lies, big lies, lies right in front of our face, and we are oblivious to almost all of it. This is shown really well in Arthur Miller’s The Crucible. Throughout the play, which takes place during the witch trials that took place in Salem, lies make up a big portion of the plot. Some of these types of lies that are used are described very well in Stephanie Ericsson’s essay The Ways We Lie. These variations of lies amplify the outrage created, through McCarthyism, and the Salem Witch trials that take place in the play The Crucible.
Throughout the endurance of Arthur Miller's The Crucible, vengeance plays a prominent role in the actions and fates of various characters. In many ways, vengeance fuels the need for retaliation. Disputes among neighbors has bred hatred and then witch trials brought out the vindictiveness of Salem's population. This leads to the deaths of many citizens in Salem by false accusations to the court. Citizens of Salem were utilizing the court system as a means of "extermination" for people who had interests or beliefs, that were contradictory to their own. As Miller states himself, "This predilection of minding other people's business was time-honored among the people of Salem, and it undoubtedly created many suspicions which were to feed the
Life’s journey is difficult for many, and at times the only way to endure its struggles is to lie. During Puritan times there was a persecution directed toward many innocent people. Known for brutal executions, the Salem Witch trials, this period in history represents the most frowned upon time in that people found themselves searching for ways out of mistakes and how to cast blame on others. This makes lying common to save reputations and lives. In The Crucible, significant characters go to extreme lengths to protect their reputations by lying.
People are often told that lying is the wrong thing to do; it is evil, inhumane, and overall terrible. Despite this fact, lying has been shown to hand people multiple benefits. These benefits can be anything from getting out of doing house chores to looking cool in front of classmates. Because of this, many people use this form of deception to remove themselves from unwanted problems in the community. The Crucible, a play written Arthur Miller, portrays a disrupted society where people are accused of witchcraft for any abnormal activity. The accused witches are either forced to “confess” to their involvement with witchcraft or be executed in the gallows. The characters in the play display to the readers that lying provides protection towards people in different ways.
In Arthur Miller's play The Crucible, Arthur intrigues audience time and time again with the historical context, social implications, and the Salem, Massachusetts Witchcraft Trials of 1962. Most members in Salem feel the need to prove their authority in ways such as accusing those who have done nothing or hanging them without proving their innocence first. The thing is authority is not made up by an authority figure, but by society. Miller’s The Crucible, demonstrates how people misuse their authority for cruel purposes through a fascinating plot, well-crafted characters, and well-set theme. During the hysteria of witchcraft trials in Salem, there were multiple figures of authority or per say the community who abused their power, Reverend Hale, Abigail Williams, Reverend Parris and Judge Danforth.
Arthur Miller writes about the tragic results of human failings in his play, The Crucible. He presents characters from the past and infuses them with renewed vitality and color. Miller demonstrates the horrifying results of succumbing to personal motives and flaws as he writes the painful story of the Salem witch trials. Not only do the trials stem from human failings but also from neglect of moral and religious considerations of that time. Characters begin to overlook Puritan values of thrift and hope for salvation. Focusing on the flawed characters, they begin to exhibit land lust, envy of the miserable and self-preservation.
Imagine a world where you could get hanged for being accused with no real evidence but, with just lies. The only way to escape death is to confess to what have you been accused of with more lies but, in addition also harming others. In the play The Crucible by Arthur Miller, Miller shows us what it was like to live in a world where the slightest lie could get you jail or worse even hanged for something you didn’t even do, and the only way to escape is to “confess”. Many people think that being accused of is a crime. The true crime in this story is when the girls lie about witches, when Abigail makes false accusations and when she also tries to kill Elizabeth Proctor just for John.
In the play The Crucible by Arthur Miller, dishonesty played a role as an egotistic thing. Girls lied to save their lives and their love ones. John Proctor lied to his wife, he thought he is being deceitful to his wife and it would be better than saying the truth and hurt his wife. That’s the reason why Elizabeth get cold towards John. Mary Warren lied that John threat her to save Elizabeth. Rev. Parris lied to judges, he said he didn’t saw any of girls naked while when Mr. Hale arrived at Salem Rev. Parris told him he saw the girls dancing and he saw one girl naked. The girls started the lies and brought throughout the whole play. Girls brought up the Witchcraft Trial in Salem. The fact that fraud played a big role throughout the play, characters like Abigail & girls lied to the court, people who were charge with witchcrafts were guiltless, they’ve suffered, hanged, and died because of lies. In the whole play of The Crucible dishonesty is the number one cause of witchcraft trial, dishonesty hurt who are innocents, dishonesty breaks trust.
In small towns across America, it is common for people to have close bonds with the other members in the community, so dealing with this occurrence, one person's perspective on another can be told throughout the village. With this comes hateful rumors and potentially false views that can ruin one's reputation. This situation is extremely relatable to the small town Salem, Massachusetts in 1692 during the witch trials. This small town is full of different perspectives and different views on people, particularly the people who have been blamed in doing a certain act as Arthur Miller shows in the play The Crucible. The situation in The Crucible is not far from the 1984 sex abuse allegations in Jordan, Minnesota, where a man named James Rud was accused of sexually abusing a girl he babysat. He was sent to prison on a 40-year sentence for an act he did not commit and was blamed, ultimately ruining his reputation. As shown in both The Crucible and the sex abuse allegations, being blamed can ruin a person's reputation which obscures who that person actually is in reality.
“The best way to avoid becoming a scapegoat is to find one.” Warren Eyster writer of The Goblin of Eros. Everyone has at least told one lie about someone to escape consequence. It could be done by politicians, your friends, siblings, and you. You pass such lies and rumors, in result the innocent will never be seen as innocent. They will always have this heinous act under their name. The Crucible is a story filled with plot twist, revenge, love and passion. Salem, a town in Massachusetts, is filled with juicy secrets untold, until some girls accused people of doing Witchcraft and working with the devil. In the end many people are executed because the court does not believe them. History repeats itself once again. In a similar case three men, called the West Memphis 3, were accused of killing three 8 year old boys. Steven Branch, Michael Moore and Christopher Byers will all striped down of thier clothes and were killed. Damien Echols, Jesse Misskelley, and Jason Baldwin were all charged with murder 30 days after case was brought up. They confessed and pleaded innocent but there was so much evidence against them. Both cases have taught our society many things. The Crucible and the West Memphis 3 both have people bringing up false rumors about each other, testimonies were faked, the accused never got the proper justice. People are interrogated for hours and hours, and finally confess what needs to be heard. The rumors spread and has been created as evidence against the