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Theme Of Reconciliation In The Crucible

Decent Essays

Arthur Miller’s play The Crucible features a group of religious people struggling under a harsh lifestyle in the town of Salem in 1692. Throughout the play, Miller developed the theme of hysteria and referred to the witchcraft trials as a giant “crucible” that tests with fire those who are weak in spirit. Along with the protagonist John Proctor, many of the witchcraft victims are driven to grim and tragic end in the face of undeserved judgements. By unfolding John Proctor’s path to reconciliation and comparing different positions take by other characters, Miller affirms that is better to suffer death and maintain one’s integrity, than to live a life of moral compromise and hypocrisy. John Proctor is caught in an obvious dilemma between his own moral principles and extrinsic honor as soon as the curtain rises. A married farmer with three sons in his family, Proctor commits adultery by having a secret affair with his former servant, an unmarried girl named Abigail Williams. His sense of guilt drugs him down to an abyss where he locks his wife, Elizabeth Proctor, out of his adoration and of his faithfulness and of his honesty. But above all, John Proctor concerns more about his scandal being exposed in public. Proctor, an upright Christian man who believes in God and the authentic righteousness in his own way, will not expose himself to public shame. Miller manipulated John Proctor’s sin to be the foundation of subsequent events, because he was aware that readers might expect

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