How Did John Proctor Change In The Crucible

​Would you rather die and know you did the right thing or would you rather live a life of shame and be seen as a villain. In Arthur Miller’s The Crucible John Procter is seen as a strong hardworking man who sees himself as evil. John changes throughout the play and realized he was good. John‘s past was sinful and with the help of others he overcame his past and through his actions many readers notice his dynamic change.

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.

After the court sentences him to hang, the only way Proctor can survive is by saying he participated in witchcraft. However, he decides not to sign his name stating, “Because it is my name! Because I cannot have another in my life! Because I lie and sign myself to lies! Because I am not worth the dust on the feet of them that hang! How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul; leave me my name!” (133). He has given up his reputation in the trials for the sake of the town. Now all he wants is his name, all he wants is a shred of respect. He wants people to remember him as a good man, not an adulterer who practiced witchcraft. Elizabeth, now realizes what John has done as she proclaims, “He has goodness now. God forbid I take it from him” (134). She sees what John has done; he has given up not only his reputation, but his life for the people of the town. For if he admitted to witchcraft, the town would have yet another reason to believe in it and join in the hysteria. In conclusion, Proctor’s pride makes him a tragic hero because by not signing his name to the papers, the court sentences him to death. However, through his pride Elizabeth learns to forgive him of adultery, seeing what he has done for the people of Salem.

The infamous play, The Crucible written by Arthur Miller takes place in the town of Salem, Massachusetts when a group of girls accuses innocent people in the puritan society of witchcraft. Abigail Williams, a young girl and her friends are caught doing a forbidden action considered to the puritan community, and try to draw the community’s attention away from their wrongdoing. As the puritan civilization starts to believe these juvenile girls about the devil being present in certain individuals, other authentic personals try to fight for their society as a whole. Throughout the book, characters show that the community is more important than the individual by sacrificing their perseverance, passion, and integrity when their morals are challenged.

The Crucible, a historical play based on events of the Salem witchcraft trials, takes place in a small Puritan village in the colony of Massachusetts in 1692. The witchcraft trials, as Miller explains in a prose prologue to the play, grew out of the particular moral system of the Puritans, which promoted interference in others' affairs as well as a repressive code of conduct that frowned on any diversion from norms of behavior.

The Crucible is a play that takes place in Salem, Massachusetts during the year 1692 and in short contains Abigail the Reverend’s niece accusing several women of practicing witchcraft. This leads to a witch-hunt. John Proctor and his wife Elisabeth realize that Abigail, with whom John once had an affair with, started all this in order to get Elizabeth hung in order for her to be able to get back together with John. Trying to save his wife’s life John testifies in court about the affair. Elizabeth trying to save her husband, and not knowing he admitted to it, denies it causing John to be accused of witchcraft. John was offered the chance to sign a confession and save his life but refuses to do so as he is concerned over the innocent citizens

John Proctor longs to protect his name. After being falsely accused of witchcraft, out of spite by Abigail Williams, Proctor could easily save himself at the mere price of his reputation by lying and admitting to committing the crime of witchcraft. John battles with himself between doing the honorable thing and hanging alongside his friends for a lie or saving himself from the gallows and living with the burden of knowing that he dishonored his fellow prisoners.Although Proctor does admit to witchcraft, he refuses to sign over his precious name on it. John explains,

The Crucible is set in the seventeenth- century Salem, Massachusetts during the Salem witch trial. It starts of with Reverend Parris, a man very concerned about his reputation, accusing his orphaned niece Abigail Williams of taking part in witchcraft after his daughter is unconscious after dancing in the woods. A technique used by Parris is characterization, which utilizes the thoughts, actions and dialogues in the construction of characters. Arthur Miller uses characterization to build the character of Reverend Samuel Parris as arrogant , selfish, and deceptive.

Johns tragedy to his hero life was his lust for Abigail while married to Elizabeth. Abigail speaks of their affair when John comes to see what has happened with Betty and to send Mary home; “ABIGAIL: I know how you clutched my back behind your house and sweated like a stallion whenever I come near! Or did I dream that? It's she put me out, you cannot pretend it were you. I saw your face when she put me out, and you loved me then and you do now!” (Miller 21), a couple lines later John tries to stop it, “PROCTOR: Abby, I may think of you softly from time to time. But I will cut off my hand before I’ll ever reach of you again. Wipe it out of mind. We never touched, Abby.” (Miller 22). In Act Three, while they are in court John confesses. He says, “I have known her, sir. I have known her.” (Miller 102), that actually means he has had sex with her. After John confesses his ‘good name’ takes a turn for the worse, and he is no longer the John Proctor everyone trusted. “PROCTOR: … I have rung the doom of my good name…” (Miller 103), this is when John, and everyone else know he is no longer the ‘hero’ he is thought to be.

The Crucible is a play written in 1953 by a New Yorker named Arthur Miller. The play revolves around the Salem Witch Trials in Salem, Massachusetts, which happened during the late 1600’s. This was the time period where people would accuse others of performing witchcraft and “signing the devil’s black book in their own blood.” The witches would then either be jailed, hanged, or burned at the stake. It was a very dark time for the Puritans of Massachusetts. In the play, it is caused by a group of girls falsely accusing people they don’t like of being witcher. Miller threw in references to the “Red Scare” and the Communist Hunts during the 1950’s as well, as he was comparing the two events to each other. The characters and events in The Crucible were based on the diaries Miller found, so every character in the book were real people who were alive during the trials. Even though Rebecca Nurse, a wealthy old woman, and Elizabeth Proctor, wife of John Proctor, are separated by wealth, social status and likability (how liked they are), but they are very similar to each other because they have both been accused of witchcraft, and their personalities are more similar than once thought.

The Crucible, by Arthur Miller, is written about the Salem Witch Trials back in 1692. It began with a group of girls messing around in the woods and when someone walks down and catches them dancing, which is against the rules, they were accused of performing witchcraft. This is what started the Salem witch trials. As the play goes on it tells the story about the accusations of witchcraft and the punishments results of the accusations. Throughout this play there were two main characters, John Proctor and Abigail Williams. John Proctor was a father of three boys, married to Elizabeth, had sexual relations with Abigail, and tends to stands up for what he believes is right. In the play, Proctor comes across many problems that are ethical dilemmas, one of the biggest is his reputation, and deciding whether to lie to stay alive or tell the truth and die.

The Crucible takes place in the early England colonies in Salem, Massachusetts during what we know as the witch trials. It is based on a group of girls involved in “witch like” activities, who begin to accuse others of committing witchcraft just so that they do not get into trouble. One girl controls the group, Abigail Williams, and she plots against Elizabeth Proctor who is married to John Proctor, who Abigail had an affair with. Due to these childish and dramatic acts of Abigail and the girls, half the townspeople were taken to trial and found guilty of witchery and worshipping the devil and were sentenced to hang. Not till the end did the townspeople realize their mistake about the accusations, which turned out to be false.

The Crucible is a novel based on the Salem Witch Trials in Massachusetts, written by Arthur Miller. The Crucible demonstrates forbidden temptation between John Proctor and Abigail Williams, honor and dishonor in the town of Salem, ruthless revenge, and the strive for high social status. The narrative style of this play is standard 1950s everyday language. The Crucible is set in a theocratic society of Puritanism in 1692.

Elizabeth Proctor is an honest and virtuous christian woman from Salem. Abigail being the pretentious girl from the village accuses her of witchcraft causing, Elizabeth to be in prison. While Elizabeth is in prison her husband, John Proctor admits to lechery with Abigail. Elizabeth shows her loyalty towards John by lying in court to protect him (Miller 46). Although the affair hurt Elizabeth, there is still a devotion towards her husband.

Arthur Miller wrote the play The Crucible in 1953. The Crucible takes place in the late 1600`s around a town called Salem in Massachusetts. Miller went to Salem and acquired historical documents about the Salem witch trials and used the real people's diaries and other writings to gather information on what happened and how it happened. He also used the information to create interesting and real characters that would grab and hold audiences attention. His most memorable characters, Abigail Williams and John Proctor, are really the center pieces of the play. Although Abby and Proctor in The Crucible seem like polar opposites, they are however one in the same as they use different methods to reach an unlikely bet yet common goal proving how in common they really are.