In The Crucible, there are three attributes that come into play to make certain points in the story. They bring out the mood and tone of the play as well as the film. These three things are the weather, seasons and the time of day. “Here’s what i think: weather is never just weather.” (Foster 70) This quote is one of the many quotes from Thomas C. Foster. Weather has more meaning to it that what it seems when it comes to literature. In The Crucible, there are many instances where weather comes into the story as allusions. The weather in the film tells the person viewing that something good or bad will happen. For example, the fog in the woods when Tituba had all of the girls dancing around the kettle foretells that the actions being performed
The swiftness of judgment of many people led to unfair trials. Many people from the play were considered guilty until proven innocent, and even then it was hard to prove innocence. You either conformed and said that you did witchcraft, or kept your dignity and went to the gallows. The fears of evil encroaching upon the people of Salem in The Crucible led to coincidences turning into witchcraft, harsh judgment of the accused, swift judgment of the accused, and many lives being ruined.
A crucible is a container which is heated to separate impurities mainly from metals and sometimes other substances. Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible, takes place in a quiet Massachusetts town known as Salem. Rumors of witchcraft, however have unfortunately left the townspeople susceptible to blame one another. A quiet town virtually turned in a mad haven for blame, revenge, and dark satisfaction overnight. The reader witnesses all of these events unfold as they delve into the story of The Crucible and reveal how revenge reveals the motives of many characters.
In the beginning of The Crucible, there was a scene that shaped the whole play and affected almost everyone in the village, this scene was the forest scene. There had been many things that related to the forest scene. The largest part of it although had been if this scene would not have happened, the sentences of death and the confusion around the village might not have had happened. Three things that are tied together with the forest is that it is prohibited for anyone to go into there because of how dangerous it is, the way it gets accused of witchery, and how it caused such innocent people to be sentenced to death.
Reputation shines as a theme in the play. Through reputation comes discrimination and in the crucible almost all the witches are judged on reputation and this is important in today's world especially with things such as racism. Another critical theme in The Crucible is the role that hysteria can play in tearing apart a community. Hysteria messes with logic and enables people to believe that their neighbors, whom they have always considered upstanding people, are committing unbelievable crimes. Intolerance is key in the crucible. Because Salem is a theocratic society, moral and state laws are the same and therefore there is no room for error and intolerance becomes current. Danforth shows this when in Act III he says "a person is either with this court or he must be counted against it." Empowerment is central in modern day society and appears in The Crucible many times. The play shows how power corrupts and how certain characters use there power in association with fear, to get there way.
“A psychosomatic disorder is an illness caused or aggravated by a mental factor such as an internal conflict, which causes the body stress” (Van Heck). The year 1692 was filled with mass hysteria, along with many forms of mental, or psychosomatic diseases, but a doctor working in the year of 1692 had never perceived a psychosomatic disorder. In The Crucible, many of the girls who accused innocent women of being witches, showed multiple signs of a true psychosomatic illness. These young girls showed signs of a psychosomatic disorder because of their ability to make themselves faint, turn their skin cold, and frighten themselves by pretending to see objects that they did not physically see. The characters may have developed a psychosomatic illness from self-blame, stress, and/or anxiety. More or less, a psychosomatic disease affects a human's brain, which can then cause physical ailments to other parts of the body, such as pale skin and/or tachycardia. It has been highly controversial that humans can create their own psychosomatic illness and there will be many facts in the following paragraphs to prove as to how the illnesses have been created in a human's own head.
In The Crucible, Arthur Miller uses themes to display thoughts throughout the book. The theme that seems to be the center point of the story is religion. Religion is on the character’s minds with every action they do. When something goes wrong in the town, religion is sought out as a cause. When the witch trials begin, the devil is supposed to be the source of the troubles. Arthur Miller vividly uses religion to show the readers how important religion is to the people of Salem.
‘The Crucible’ is an allegory. An allegory is a story with an obvious meaning but if you look deeper into it, there is another meaning. In this case, the obvious meaning is the Salem witch-hunt and the hidden meaning is McCarthyism. McCarthyism started in the early 1950’s and it was governmental accusations with no evidence. Joseph McCarthy started doing trials on those he thought were communist, but he had no evidence for it. This is the same as the witch trials in The Crucible. Arthur Miller wrote this in response to McCarthyism.
A ‘crucible’ is an object in which substances are combined and then subjected to high temperatures. Arthur Miller uses this theme to guide “The Crucible” from the exposition, when Puritan girls danced in the woods, to Proctor’s death by the hangman’s noose. Hale and Danforth are closely intertwined in their beliefs and views at the beginning of the play, but, as tensions and temperatures rise, they begin to separate; ultimately ending with contrary beliefs. In the opening scenes, Hale and Danforth are present in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692 to cast out demons and witches. When the final curtain falls at the end of Act Four, Hale recognizes that the Salem Witch Trials were a result of repressed emotions and conflicts, and the desire to express them under the pretext of witchcraft. Danforth cannot and will not recognize this fact. Thus, Miller develops the characters of Hale and Danforth into foils for each other by the end of the novel; the growing tension is made evident through dialogue, character development, and through the theme of pride.
The purpose of a crucible is to melt things in and for this you need very high temperatures. This is illustrated in the play, when the judge Danforth says to Proctor in Act Three 'We burn a hot fire here; it melts down all concealment'. The court scenes were times of tension, intensity, pressure and conflicts between powerful authority refusing to realise they have signed away innocent lives on the strength of a lie. Also things are permanently and physically changed in a crucible, they are turned from one thing into another. This is reflected in the play by the fact that many things in the play are exerted
The Crucible a play about how choices can impact or kill someones’ life so strongly with The Red Scare having the exact same concept. Miller’s Crucible was written during the red scare to tell Americans to wake up and show how history really can repeat itself. In The Crucible Abigail and some young girls from 1692 go dancing in the woods and cook some food in a pot when Parris the head of town and Abigail’s uncle find them doing this. He calls witchcraft and the blame games begin. This is parallel to the Red Scare when people in the 1950’s were being accused of communism. The conflict in the Crucible is parallel to the Red Scare because of the blame game, hysteria and, .
The novel, The Crucible was written in 1953 by Arthur Miller, which was based on the Salem Witch Trials existing in the late 1600s. In the play, Abigail and several other young women accuse innocent citizens of Salem for the action of witchcraft. During the trials, many individuals were unfairly persecuted; such as John Proctor. This event in history may be associated with the Red Scare, in which individuals were tried for their questionable influences of communism in the United States. When Miller compares the character of John Proctor to himself, the reader is able to relate the similar experiences that both men faced. The Crucible demonstrates the struggle against corruption involving the court, which lead to the death of many innocent individuals in Salem. The Crucible generates an allegory for Arthur Miller’s struggles with McCarthyism because of his similar experience relating to John Proctor’s battle against the Salem Witch Trials, and the relation between the actions of the court in both situations. Arthur Miller uses several writing methods in order to convey The Crucible as an allegory for his struggles with McCarthyism. Miller demonstrates how the Crucible represents an allegory for his conflict with McCarthyism by relating his experiences with the plot of the novel. Miller relates the novel to his struggles by stating, “Should the accused confess, his honesty could only be proved by naming former confederates.” (Are You Now… 34) Miller is explaining how the court
In Act 1, the dramatic tension is started when Hale finds out about how Abigail and the girls were dancing in the forest and begins to interrogate her. This puts pressure on her and she tries to minimize the situation which can be inferred in the line "Why a very little frog jumped" (35). She uses the phrase "very little" which makes the "movement" insignificant. Eventually, the pressure gets to Abigail and she blames Tituba which immediately reduces the pressure on her and starts the process of accusation. It also increases the tension because a part of the story has unravelled to Hale- who is currently the most powerful person in the room. The blame can be evidenced in the quote "I never called him! Tituba, Tituba-"( 35). She chose to blame
that he is daft and why later on in the play why he is not well liked.
The Crucible, a twisted playwright, written by Arthur Miller is an allegory to the McCarthy trials of the 1950’s. An allegory is a story with two levels of meaning- literal and symbolic. In an allegory the characters, events, and instances relate to real people, events, and instances. (“Definition of Allegory” R104). Characters like John Proctor, Abigail Williams, and the Court, represent real people like Arthur Miller, Joseph R. McCarthy and the organization created, the HUAC. Events like the puritans being brought into the court and John Proctor having to choose between staying to oppose the court or using his wife as leverage were similar to the accused that were brought in, as well as Miller refusing bribery. Instances when the court had no substantial proof were in comparison to the HUAC having no evidence and taking away the passports of the accused. Miller wrote The Crucible as an allegory to show that people in power take advantage of their authority. He wanted to teach that being under pressure and living in fear can affect the decisions that are made in everyday life and to criticize the institutions that wronged the vulnerable people during these times.
During the time The Crucible was set, the community of Salem was awry. It did not have the solid characteristics of what a healthy town should look like. Instead there was no trust between people, everyone was watching out for only themselves, and most of the townspeople were turning their backs on the disastrous deeds of the court. The people of Salem feel like they have no one to turn to, so fear crept into their minds and hearts. They developed hysteria which caused the town to slowly disintegrate. This panic allows other people in their community to take advantage of them and manipulate them for their own purposes. In his play, The Crucible, Arthur Miller shows how vengeance and greed destroy the community through the characters of Abigail Williams, Mr. and Mrs. Putnam, and Reverend Parris.