Examples Of Hysteria In The Crucible

In Arthur Miller's, The Crucible (1953), he shows us how hysteria took over the town of Salem, Massachusetts in 1692. In The Crucible, the townspeople were led to believe that the devil had settled in their town and witches were responsible for it. In the play many people played a part in the hysteria that consumed the town, but some people had bigger effects than others because of their decisions and moral blindness. How did this handful of people cause so much hysteria? How does a town get so easily consumed by lies? When hysteria took over Salem many people were affected, lives were ruined and many innocent people were accused.

“Whatever hysteria exists is inflamed by mystery, suspicion, and secrecy. Hard and exact facts will cool it” (Elia Kazan). The Crucible by Arthur Miller is about the story of the Salem witch trials and how people react to the situation during the 1690’s. Miller’s message concerning individual conscience in an atmosphere of fear and mass hysteria in The Crucible is that people can turn on others and suspect each other or tell lies or false accusations in order to save themselves or loved ones.

There is no such thing as an honest person. Everybody has lied at least once in their lifetime. In Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, several girls in a highly religious and Puritan Salem, Massachusetts get caught dancing in the woods. In order to avoid punishment, these girls lie and accuse others of witchcraft. Eventually, it is revealed that the people in the town accused each other of witchcraft for ulterior motives. Regardless of their motives, these accusations created mass hysteria in Salem. The three people that were responsible for creating mass hysteria in Salem, Massachusetts were Parris, Abigail, and Hale.

In the context of “The Crucible” the characters who are capable of ending the witch trails and the mass hysteria would be Abigail and Parris, Because Abigail can just say the truth that what her and the other girls where doing in the forest to the other town people’s she and the other girls will not be punished harshly. Alose Parris knows this because Abigail told the truth to him and Parris can just tell the other court members and not cause all this mass hysteria. During “The Crucible” Parris says to Abigail that he saw them in the forest, that there was a naked person running around, even though Abigail told him the truth about what they were doing, Parris decided not to say anything to anyone. Much of this stems from the dramatic exposition at the start of Act I. Some people may say that he had no choice because Parris says that it will make it bad in his name and he might lose his job in the court because of that he picked the wrong decision and that led to nineteen people dying.

During the late 1940’s and the early 1950’s, America acted out of fear instead of their head. Author Miller motivated to write The Crucible due to his being alive during the late 1950’s when McCarthyism was prevalent in the U.S. He was trying to make the comparison of the two-time periods. Author Miller wrote The Crucible to point out the hysteria caused by the Red Scare by drawing comparisons with fear fueling hysteria, the ignoring of evidence, and types of people who were falsely accused.

In Arthur Miller's play, The Crucible, hysteria is being spread throughout the Puritan community of Salem. Abigail is the main reason for all of this, with her lies and her persuading her friends to follow along with the lies and blaming others. The historical setting, characters, and events have shown us hysteria throughout the play and how the people of Salem handle the feeling of being in constant fear. As we read the play it is easy to see that hysteria causes people to jump to conclusions.

Kaya Alvarez Grimmett English 11- Argumentative Essay 01 May 2024. When it comes to fear, have you ever wondered what might come when facing it? Fear in ‘The Crucible’ mass hysteria is a big problem. Mass hysteria can be stopped by an individual taking accountability for their wrongs, and being very aware as well as not believing every story. Fear can be spread amongst others, and a reaction to a situation.

“Whatever hysteria exists is inflamed by mystery, suspicion and secrecy. Hard and exact facts will cool it.” -Elia Kazan. Elia Kazan, a famous actor and director in the 1950’s, was accused of being a communist during The Red Scare.

John Mellencamp once said, “When you live in hysteria, people start thinking emotionally.” Arthur Miller's drama The Crucible expresses many themes including the dangers of pride and envy. However, out of many themes conveyed in The Crucible the most applicable, that relates to Puritan America and the McCarthy Era, is the role that mass hysteria plays in tearing down a community. In The Crucible, hysterical fear becomes a senseless means of declaring the bitterness and anger subdued by Puritan society.

The Crucible was a melting pot of bad ingredients that created a scene of incredible hysteria. Due to this hysteria the characters do actions that would normally be out of place or unethical. The mass panic, while imagined and irrational, was the driving force behind the play, so what caused the town of Salem to lose their senses? A town does not go off the deep end without a cause. The religion, court system, and social climate of Salem and the effects of the aforementioned that went behind the hysteria.

Within Arthur Miller’s award-winning play, The Crucible, there is a constant trend that flows through time. As the tale persists, Salem, Massachusetts gets wound up in the witch hunt of 1692, creating an infectious hysteria on all the villagers. City-wide fear overtakes individual thought and reasoning as well as it can today in America’s “trivial” matters.

Mass hysteria has affected many different groups and has led them to do very exorbitant things. Some such groups are: the people of Salem in 1692-1693 who held the Salem Witch Trials where 20 people were executed, the townspeople of Halifax who claimed to be attacked by a man with a knife, which caused many people to wound themselves for attention, and the 90+ students of an all-girls school in Tanzania who laughed uncontrollably for up to fifteen days. In The Crucible, Arthur Miller effectively uses the Salem Witch Trials to show: what can cause mass hysteria, what mass hysteria can lead to, and how mass hysteria can be manipulated for someone’s gain.

1. Throughout The Crucible, the theme of mass hysteria is presented. For example, after Tituba “confessed” to have been working under pressure, Abigail screams “I want the light of God, I want the sweet love of Jesus! I danced for the Devil; I saw him, I wrote in his book; I go back to Jesus; I kiss His hand. I saw Sarah Good with the Devil! I saw Goody Osburn with the Devil! I saw Bridget Bishop with the Devil!” (54) The reason why Abigail suddenly “confesses” starts with Tituba. Tituba was under extreme pressure when Reverend Hale and many others were screaming at her; therefore she decided to just give them what they want – a confession – so they would stop. Seeing this, Abigail joins in that she will not be interrogated later, thus adding to the overall hysteria and madness of a witch hunt. In addition, the theme of vengeance is also displayed when John Proctor blatantly states “I'll tell you what's walking Salem - vengeance is walking Salem… now the little crazy children are jangling the keys of the kingdom,

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 today's society there are many cases of mass hysteria just like long ago. In the book John Proctor says a quote that hits big time for mass hysteria, he says “God is dead” while laughing insanely, and if that does not cause mass hysteria then nothing does.