The Mass Hysteria In Arthur Miller's The Crucible

The Crucible, written by Arthur Miller, was a historical play written about the Salem witch trials that took place in the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1692-93. The Salem witch trials created mass hysteria throughout the entire village of Salem, which was also mainly inhabited by Puritans. Puritans had a set ideal of firm beliefs that managed how they lived. Essentially, they were living as an elect, which meant they (referring to the Puritans) had a place in heaven for the righteous acts they have done in the physical world. Meaning, any sinful acts could potentially hinder the chances of entering heaven as an elect. The Crucible, questioned everything the Puritans abided by. It questioned the basic morals of a pure lifestyle, adultery and

Abigail is very self centered, she does not care who gets hurt by her actions, as long as she is in the clear from being known as the one who started this whole village to go down in the dumps. In the beginning of this story, Abigail seems to be a nice girl. Although, as the story develops, she turns out to be a manipulative girl who does anything she wishes to get what she yearns for. Abigail should have just told the truth in the first place, it is much better to confess instead of lie so that God will reconcile her and she can go along with her life. Many innocent lives were hurt and everyone turned on each other because Abigail did not confess. In the end, it is never right to hurt others for a personal

How does fear and hysteria play a significant role in creating and driving the conflict and the chaotic events that take place in Arthur Miller’s ‘ The Crucible’?

People are taken from their homes, tried for a crime they did not commit, and some even convicted upon false accusations as a result of fear and hysteria running rampant throughout society. The citizens of Salem, Massachusetts experienced this phenomenon in 1692 when the witch trials arose. Arthur Miller portrays this occurrence in his play The Crucible in which he accurately displays the effects that hysteria and fear have on Salem and subsequently how it affects the citizens who are accused without substantial evidence. Miller also represents how unjust the court system was in Salem in his playwright, the accused were guilty until proven innocent similarly to a modern day witch hunt during the Cold War. This modern day witch hunt of the

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.

Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, is a play that replicates the actual events of the Salem Witch Trials. The event is considered mass hysteria because there was a vast group of people who were behaving completely irrationally. The Crucible takes place in Salem, Massachusetts throughout 1962 and 1963. Salem was a theocratic town, meaning their laws were derived from religion. Children dancing in the woods with Tituba, the slave of the town Reverend, led to accusations of witchcraft because dancing was thought of as the devil's work. There were, of course, a few members of Salem who did not believe in witchcraft, but their opinions were ignored. The reason this became a hysteria is, all one had to in order to get someone arrested for witchcraft was state their name. These accusations then became a way to get revenge on someone who had done wrong to them. The large number of victims of the Salem Witch Trials, and the speed and senselessness of the spreading of accusations, makes this event a tragic part of our history.

Mass hysteria has afflicted a multitude of groups and has compelled them to do very exorbitant things. Some such groups are: the citizens of Salem in 1692-1693 who held the Salem Witch Trials where 20 people were executed, the townspeople of Halifax who claimed to be assailed by a man with a knife, which led 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.

In the actual history of the Salem witch trials over 150 people were accused of bewitchment. Though most were hung they were all innocent. The Crucible was not only allegory to Arthur Miller's anti-communist ideals but a great text about some of the actual accounts in history during the actual Salem witch trials. In the play Arthur Miller used fear, hysteria, and revenge as important elements to keep the story going also to keep the readers wanting to read more and find out what will happen next

The hysteria behind the Salem Witch Trials seems to have come from nothing. There are multiple theories that go from a mental mass hysteria to a physical prejudice. Going through the timeline of the trials, theories become stronger and weaker and in the end, the answer is a matter of whichever theory you believe has the strongest evidence, an opinion. Albeit, the easiest way to explain the hysteria could be the easiest one to explain, which was that it was all subconsciously coincidental mental mass hysteria.

There were many conflicts and troubles in this play. No one was getting along and there were many arguments. This all started when Abigail and a group of girls went dancing in a forest trying to conjure up spirits. They get caught and to not get in trouble, the girls blame others and somehow get away with it. Many people are taken to jail, and many even hung. All this instead of just telling the truth. Many struggle with telling the truth because they are scared of the consequence. “Keeping everyone happy and telling the truth at the same time is an extraordinarily difficult art.” (Howell). By Abigail blaming others, it causes the judge to come in the picture and many more others. In Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible, a young girl named Abigail, Judge Danforth, and all the townspeople were the reasons why there were so much mass hysteria in Salem.

In both Salem during the 1690s and in the entirety of the United States in the 1930s, mass hysteria took over for short times due to word of mouth. In Salem, Massachusetts, twenty people were convicted and hanged for the crime of witchcraft in the time between February 1692 and May 1693. It began mainly with a pair of young girls, nine year old Betty Parris and her eleven year old cousin, Abigail Williams, who began displaying fits of what was deemed devil work by doctors who could not diagnose it as a known illness (and if you know about colonial medicinal practises, you wouldn’t be surprised). The hysteria during the night of Halloween of 1938; while the threat of Hitler’s invasion of Europe were constantly broadcasted via radio throughout an already paranoid United States; was in the form of a radio dramatization of H.G.Wells’ novel, War of the Worlds. In both instances, the use of a common paranoia - in

Mass Hysteria Throughout The Crucible Mass hysteria is when a group of people panic over a false fear or threat. Arthur Miller uses and develops the theme of Mass Hysteria in hiis play The Crucible to show readers the major effects that it had on people throughout history. Mass Hysteria plays a major role in The Crucible as the people of Salem here of the accusations of witchcraft they go wild out of fear and anxiety and begin accusing people over something that wasn’t even real. One example of Mass Hysteria in The Crucible, is when Abigail accuses Tituba of witchcraft. This is an example of mass hysteria because Abigail was beginning the witch hunt in Salem.

In the play The Crucible a group of females in Salem accused many of Salem's residents of witchcraft, which soon led to mass hysteria. A similar occurrence happened in 1999 when people thought batch of Coca Cola was contaminated and there was a widespread of panic throughout several countries. This panic lasted for months regardless of not having any proof of the coke actually causing people to get sick. Countries starting banning the drink and the company lost millions of dollars.

During the Salem Witch Trials of 1962, nearly 20 people were sentenced to death, upon being accused as “hosts” of the devil and his evil ways of life. In the novel, The Crucible by Arthur Miller he depicts the mass hysteria of the Salem Witch Trials. The Witch Trials were provoked by the strict religious beliefs of the Puritan community, in which the people believed that the devil was constantly trying to pervade their religious communities and their Christian beliefs. Within the Crucible, Abigail's accusations and other acts of self-preservation can be ascribed to remnants of her traumatizing past (with the brutality of her parents murder), her involvement in an adulterous relationship with John Proctor, and her desperation for survival

“It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation, and only one bad one to lose it.” This is a quote by Benjamin Franklin and it explains how the puritan society in The Crucible work. this quote shows how fragile a reputation can be, you can spend your whole life increasing your reputation, but one wrong move and it’s completely wrong. In The Crucible, many of Arthur Miller’s characters are very concerned with their reputation. In early American Puritan society reputation was one the most important values in their community, which leads to many characters that overvalue their reputation. Characters in this play become so obsessed their reputation that it causes