Examples Of Fear In The Crucible

Fear can lead to a lot of things, but unfortunately, in humans it usually leads to something bad. Throughout history, fear has lead to some of the most violent actions by man, and some of the biggest collapses of organized society. In early American history, the people of Salem experienced this for themselves. Arthur Miller shows this in his book. The society of Salem that Miller creates in The Crucible shows how fear can slowly cause rational thought to deteriorate, leading to mass hysteria and eventually the breakdown of civilized behavior.

Abby, an average, rebellious teenager, lives her day-to-day life as one might expect. She ignores authority when she is around her friends, keeps secrets, and gets out of trouble by using the outcasts of the school as scapegoats. She seems to have an air of authority and coolness that everyone wants, but little do they know that she is just trying her best to fit in. Some people might say that Abby’s whole life is influenced by the fear of fitting in. In the play The Crucible, there are also many characters who are motivated by fear. This play is about the Salem witch trial and how the conditions escalated to the point that 17 people died. Although some people say fear doesn’t have a big influence on people’s actions, fear is the greatest motivator of human behavior.

Fear: a simple word with an abundance of meanings. To one, fear can be losing a loved one and to another it can be being alone for their entire life. Ghandi once claimed that the enemy of every soul is not hate, but fear itself. This enemy, however, can be derived from hate, for everything you loathe is the reason for your distress. Taking the Salem Witch Trial as an example, fear portrayed an enormous role in the lives of many. During the time period of 1692 to 1693, fear controlled an entire village by manipulation and hatred. Arthur Miller’s The Crucible perfectly captures how fear is exploited by characters in the play because these characters used their hatred towards others to build up horror in the sacred town of Salem. Although this classic novel was written over fifty years ago, Miller touched on timeless societal fears that still apply to the existing world today. As seen through Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, fear can prompt people to denounce their beliefs in order to save their own lives, prevent their reputation from being tarnished, and it can make one take extreme measures in order to protect the ones they love.

“Ultimately, no good can come from this type of decision-making. Fear prompts retreat. It is the antipode to progress. Just when we need new ideas most, everyone is seized up in fear, trying to prevent losing what we have left” (Berns). Fear can be defined as a biochemical, emotional, and physical response to something negative or thrill situation. Most individuals have a negative reaction to fear causing them to obtain the physical response of “fight or flight” in face of fear or avoiding anything that causes fear altogether. The characters in The Crucible all reacted to the witch trials differently and that most likely was because of how afraid they were of the accusations. If someone was more fearful of the possibility that some people were witches then they were more likely to want them in jail or hung opposed to if they were not that fearful. The research question that is being explored in this essay is “What role does fear play in individuals’ decision making in Arthur Miller’s The Crucible?” In other words, fear can affect how one reacts to certain situations and it can cause them to make different decisions than they normally would.

Throughout history, mass hysterias have occurred as the result of psychological stress and the irrational fear of the unknown. In fact, the Salem Witch trial was the result of the irrational fear from the town that the devil was present in their everyday lives. In the play The Crucible, Arthur Miller presents the consequences of the fear of witchcraft spreading through the community of Salem. Laura Dimon furthers Gladwell’s argument in “What Witchcraft is Facebook” by arguing that hysterias occur because of preexisting tensions and psychological stress. Thus, as long as the fear of the unknown is present in a society, oppression and psychological abuse will endure, resulting in individuals to feeling vulnerable and succumbing to the pressures of their disordered and dysfunctional environment.

It is always important to know about events in history so that the events will not be repeated. The texts The Crucible, “Why I Wrote The Crucible,” and “Vigilante ‘Vampire-hunters’” tells about how fear has an effect on society from the Salem witch hunts to McCarthyism to modern-day. The play, The Crucible, shows how society reacts to fear when claims about witchcraft are circulated through the village, and the article “Why I Wrote The Crucible” shows how fear of communism makes society paranoid of each other. The article “Vigilante ‘Vampire-hunters’” is an example of a modern-day witch hunt, except the article deals with vampires rather than witchcraft or communists. As it is seen in all three text, society has dealt with fear in the same despairing manner over the years besides learning from mistakes in the past. The development of society’s response to fear over the years illustrates that people have not learned from mistakes made by responses in the past.

Sometimes people are very afraid of telling the truth, their fear makes them live in discouragement. Sometimes, their fear also affects others around them because they lack self confidence .When this happens, important relationships suffer. The play “The Crucible” by Arthur Miller has a dramatic storyline the characters struggle with the Puritan authority and the town people having to make a decision on who is telling the truth and who is hiring. The girls make false accusations because of their fear of the Puritan authorities because they torched Tituba and they can do that to them, also by doing this it may make their lives miserable.

One of the larger themes that affect the play The Crucible is fear and how it affects people in many ways. Some examples of fear is Mary Warren being very afraid of Abigail Williams, and Parris being afraid of losing his social status. First off fear happens many times in the play one part is in Mary Warren's actions (Mary Warren utterly Confounded and becoming overwhelmed)(Miller 225). In this part we see how Mary Warren’s fear takes hold of her and how she starts to freak out about it. The next part is where Parris is talking about people learning about his daughter betty.”Thomas, Thomas I pray you, leap not to witchcraft”(Miller 172). This is important because he is scared

Sometimes people are very afraid of telling the truth, their fear makes them live in discouragement. Sometimes, their fear also affects others around them because they lack self confidence .When this happens, important relationships suffer. The play “The Crucible” by Arthur Miller has a dramatic storyline the characters struggle with the Puritan authority and the town people having to make a decision on who is telling the truth and who is hiring. The girls make false accusations because of their fear for the Puritan authorities because they torched Tituba and they can do that to them, also by doing this it may make their lives miserable.

Fear is a common human emotion, but how everyone responds to fear varies. The way we react to fear could depend on a very large spectrum of things. It could depend on the situation or on what one fears, on the person who is expressing fears’ personality, the events leading up what is inflicting the fear, or even past experiences. It could be any number of things. Many different people could be in the exact same situation and fearing the same thing, but each of them may have completely different reactions.

In The Crucible Abigail mistrusts the girls to keep their secret that witchcraft is not real, she makes them fear her and makes them go against their own beliefs so that Abigail will not get into trouble. “Now look you. All of you. We danced. And Tituba conjured Ruth Putnam’s dead sister.

“We all have a fear of the unknown, what one does with that fear will make a difference in the world”- Lillian Russell. Since the beginning of time, fear has been something everyone has, especially when it comes to the fear of the unknown. The Salem witch trials, is a good example of that. The fear established by the claims of witchery that lead to the death of nineteen men and women, and two dogs. The play, “The crucible” by Arthur Miller, tells the story of what happened during the witch trials and the fear that lead to the to the imprisonment and death of many innocent people. Arthur Miller uses these rhetorical elements in his play to support the character’s arguments and better define the way they felt.

Mary Warren is the only one in the group of girls that tries to make things right, but was overcome with fear. When Mary Warren and John Proctor go to the court so Mary Warren could tell the truth to Danforth, they meet an unlikely enemy. Abigail and the other girls start to accuse Mary Warren of witchcraft. As this chaos is happening, Mary Warren begins to confess to witchcraft after Danforth threatens, “ You will confess yourself or you will hang!” (1337) John Proctor, trying to save Mary Warren from the influence of Danforth and the girls, begins to reach for Mary Warren.

There is a group of girls that go around accusing others. At the heart of this group is Abigail Williams. She is making a desperate attempt not to be held accountable for what happened in the woods with the dancing and singing. She knows

Can fear escalate to disaster? The Crucible written by Arthur Miller was originally written to protest the Red Scare. A time where communists spies became a national fear in the US and even ruined hundreds of lives due to suspicion. Though The Crucible takes place even before the United States was established, the Salem Witch Trials and the Red Scare had both been motivated by one thing in common which is fear taken too far. One of the main characters within the play is Abigail Williams who is a teenage girl around the age of “seventeen… A strikingly beautiful girl, an orphan, with an endless capacity for dissembling” (Miller Act one lines 29-30). Her power is abused which is known to the reader and becomes a weapon for her true intent that drives the plot. Abigail’s most important value is her obsession to be together with Proctor and even confesses to him “John- I am waiting for you every night” (Miller Act one line 415). Despite her undying affection, Proctor is a married to Elizabeth and Abigail’s feelings becomes one sided. Due to this, her motivations through the play is influenced by the abuse of her position in the role of playing God. She uses this power to mainly as vengeance to rid of Proctor’s wife, “she (to Proctor now) testify it were the wife’s familiar spirit” (Miller Act Three, lines 807-808). The obvious reason reveals key factors such as witches becoming a sensitive topic and the fact that the court evidence relies on her witnessing spirits. Her crying out the devil on Elizabeth will automatically send her to jail and leave Proctor alone for herself. Abigail’s motivation is hidden away from the court just like her trying to hide the fact that she has had an affair with John Proctor, “Mr. Danforth, he is lying!” (Miller Act three, line 837). She denies Proctor’s accusation because her name because her name within the town will no longer be a person blessed by God. She will reveal her true self who is skillfully manipulative that especially evident when she comments openly to Proctor about Elizabeth that “she is a cold, sniveling woman” and that Proctor “[he bends] to her!” (Miller Act Two lines 461-482). Of course, Abigail doesn’t recognize this nature of herself and doesn’t change the