Logan Sloan English 10B 14 May 2024 Understanding False Accusation, Paranoia, and Revenge in The Crucible The Crucible by Arthur Miller is an allegory to the McCarthy trials of the mid 1900s. A theme is a common idea that is expressed throughout the book. In the Salem witch trials, little girls claimed they could see the devil and it was within many of the members of the community. There were many trials and many people were found guilty and hanged, after a while people began to suspect a bias in the trials and the trials were all overturned. The McCarthy trials were just like the Salem witch trials, but with the fear of communism in the United States. Some themes in the crucible that are portrayed by Arthur Miller that can also be seen in the McCarthy trials are false accusations, …show more content…
Another example of this is in Act IV where Mary Warren accuses him of being a witch. He admits to it and is imprisoned and eventually killed. Another example of false accusations is when Elizabeth says in Act 3,"I am accused” (page 62). These show that many people make false accusations towards others. Another theme that is seen throughout The Crucible is paranoia. Paranoia is seen throughout the whole play but an example is in the first act where Betty is sick and in act I, Mary Warren says,“the whole country is talking witchcraft”(Page 18). This shows that just a little girl being sick and not awake caused the whole village to believe that she’s now a witch. Another example of paranoia is Parris and that people in the town want him to get kicked out. Parris doesn’t want his name ruined by his daughter getting sick and is very paranoid throughout the whole play that this will cause him to get a bad reputation. The final theme of The Crucible that I will discuss is revenge. Revenge is seen throughout the whole play and is often the motive for false accusations, and an example is
Arthur Miller’s The Crucible utilizes a fictional account of the Salem Witch Trials to expose the mob mentality associated with the Red Scare of the 1950’s and the sometimes overzealous fight against communism in America. By references to the events that took place in the Witch Trials, the playwright successfully portrays society’s behavior at its tyrannical worst, exposing fraud, faulty logic, vindictiveness, zealotry, and evil (Brater). Arthur Miller creates a parallel between the societal events of mass in the 1600’s and those in the 1950’s. In both instances, leaders use the fear of the masses for their personal gain. Abigail, the lead character in the play, and Senator Joseph McCarthy are both able to generate a groundswell that takes on a life of its own and ruins the lives of others. Arthur Miller created this analogy in order to expose Senator McCarthy and his anti-Communist propaganda by creating an analogy to the ferocity of the Salem Witch Trials. The Salem Witch Trials and the Red Scare fed on the anxiety of the general public. The Salem Witch Trials magnified society’s ability to influence the judicial system. As the hysteria regarding the existence of witches swelled, innocent individuals were executed. McCarthyism also demonstrated society’s ability to influence the judicial system. As the hysteria regarding the threat of communism in America swelled, innocent individuals were jailed, blacklisted, deported, and fired from their jobs. The Crucible first staged in 1953, was meant to raise awareness of the effect that fear can have on human behavior and judgment. The play illustrates how Abigail’s intent to avoid punishment by accusing others of culturally deviant activity led to mass hysteria. Senator McCar...
Arthur Miller, the author of The Crucible, lived during the Red Scare, which was anti-Communist as the Salem witch trials were anti-witches. The whole book is a symbol of two events that happened in history. The Red Scare and McCarthyism both serve as symbols of the Salem witch trials, which makes it an allegory. Although the play is based off of the witch trials during seventeenth century New England, the author meant for it to address his concern for the Red Scare in an indirect way. For example, just like the witch trials accusing people of witchcraft, Americans during the Red Scare accused others of being pro-Communist. The same widespread paranoia occurred as a result.
“Whatever hysteria exists is inflamed by mystery, suspicion, and secrecy. Hard and exact facts will cool it.” – Elia Kazan. In the crucible, Arthur Miller describes the witch trials and the hysteria that was caused by it. The fear of the devil overwhelms reason and makes the town of Salem even more afraid. In the story, Marry Warren falls under hysteria and through her, Arthur Miller explains that fear causes people to leave behind all their logic and reason.
The Crucible by Arthur Miller The Crucible is a fictional retelling of events in American history surrounding the Salem witch trials of the seventeenth century, yet is as much a product of the time in which Arthur Miller wrote it, the early 1950s, as it is description of Puritan society. At that particular time in the 1950s, when Arthur Miller wrote the play the American Senator McCarthy who chaired the ‘House Un-American Activities Committee’ was very conscious of communism and feared its influence in America. It stopped authors’ writings being published in fear of them being socialist sympathisers. Miller was fascinated by the Salem Witch Trials and that human beings were capable of such madness. In the 1950s the audience would have seen the play as a parallel between the McCarthy trials and the Salem Trials.
In this essay, I intend to analyse the historical context of The Crucible and its relevance in today’s society. I believe that Arthur Miller’s life and his experience of McCarthyism strongly influenced the writing of The Crucible.
In Arthur Miller 's famous play The Crucible, innocent people are falsely accused of witchcraft and are killed as a result. Even the thought of witchcraft in Salem, Massachusetts in the late 1600s would put the whole village into mass hysteria. Mass hysteria refers to collective delusions of threats to society that spread rapidly through rumors and fear. This is the main cause of why so many people were arrested and killed for witchcraft. One way people could save themselves was by falsely confessing to have performed witchcraft. Many people did not do this though. This is because the townspeople were held to very strict moral values and must uphold their good name in society. They did not want a bad reputation. In The Crucible, by Arthur
“The greater the power, the more dangerous the abuse” (Burke). Lies, power, and selfishness can destroy families, friendships, and towns. When a person has power, they may not use it properly. There have been many instances where this has happened, but two main examples are in the novel The Crucible, and in McCarthyism. The Crucible is connected to McCarthyism by its model of a desire for power, unsubstantiated accusations, and the detrimental effects of these accusations.
The Crucible is a story of when the town of Salem, Massachusetts became dominated by hysteria and foolishness during the infamous Salem Witch Trials of 1692. Influenced by the McCarthy Era, when many people (including Miller himself) were accused of being communists, Arthur Miller accurately depicts the widespread insanity of the accusations and the trials themselves in his play by using stylistic elements such as stage directions; imitative, period dialect; and allusions. Miller starts each of his acts with a narration in parenthesis and in italics. First he gives the general setting of the scene. Next, in a new paragraph, (still in parenthesis and italics) he gives more specific details about the environment. Lastly, also in a new paragraph,
The Crucible was written by Arthur Miller during an era known as McCarthyism. McCarthyism was a search, or “witch hunt”, led by Senator Joe McCarthy, for Communists in the United States Government during the nineteen-fifties. This “witch hunt” indirectly shed light upon “...one of the strangest and most awful chapters in human history”: The Salem Witchcraft Trials of 1692. The Crucible, by Arthur Miller, is a drama of the true story which took place during the seventeenth century.
Miller uses 'The Crucible' as a mirror to reflect his views on the anti-communist hysteria inspired by Senator Joseph McCarthy's "witch hunts" in the U.S. Reissue. By using the historical and controversial issue of the Salem Witch Trials, Arthur Miller's play presents an allegory for the events in modern-day America. It exploits these past events to criticize the moments in humankind's history when reason and fact became clouded by unreasonable fears and the desire to put the blame for societies dilemmas on others. The phoney witch hysteria in Salem deteriorated the sensible, and emotional stability of its citizens. Therefore exploiting the population's weakest qualities and insecurities.
Arthur Miller was one of the most famous authors of his time. He wrote many plays and novels that people still read and cherish today. One of his most famous and widely read plays by Arthur Miller is The Crucible. A tale of the Puritan “witch” hunts. The play makes the reader think of the time period of which Miller was writing about. Miller links the Puritanical time period with the Cold War Era and the Red Scare which happened just after World War II. History shows us the reasons Miller writes the way he did. McCarthyism was a big problem in America, and Miller, through his writing shows us the struggles of innocent people being accused of something they did not do. Just like the people that were accused of being communist spies in America during the Cold War Era. In the play, The Crucible, Miller shows many themes but, hatred for the “unholy” is the main theme and is justified but the justification of hatred for people because of their differences of belief, practices, and customs by the Puritan people and their values and their religious beliefs which; therefore, is justified by The Holy Bible.
The crucible, written by Arthur Miller, is about the Salem witch trials and how people react to hysteria created from the fear of witches. In the play, after hysteria breaks out, the Salem government starts persecute and hang people it believes are witches. This prompts people to start to accusing people of witchcraft. Some people who accuse others of committing witchcraft are Abigail Williams and Thomas Putnam. They do not accuse people of witchcraft to stop witchcraft, but for personal gain or to hurt others. Thomas Putnam, one of the many characters who takes advantage of the witch trials, is able to use the fear of witches to bend the court to his will. Hysteria causes people to believe claims that are clearly false. This allows Putnam to persecute his enemies. He and many other are able to get away with this because hysteria driven persecutions are not run like regular courts and the fact that witchcraft is an invisible crime allows evidence to be made up. The theme of The Crucible is when any persecution is driven by fear and people can and will manipulate the system so they can gain and hurt another.
The Crucible is about senator Joseph McCarthy and his "communist witch- hunts" that were attempting to root out subversives in government and the entertainment industry. The play itself is about the 1692 Salem witch trials in which a group of girls accused others of being witches. Arthur Miller draws parallels between this event and his own trial for supposedly being a communist agent. This essay will speak of two themes I noticed throughout the book: deceitfulness and reputation. These themes will be presented through text references and characters within the play.
‘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.
Fear should not be the way to look for answers when situations arise that can’t be explained. People tend to confuse fear and paranoia with reason and often make rash decisions, because they let their fear run rampant. The role of reason and logic in Puritan societies is often overshadowed by paranoia and fear. In “ The Crucible,” written by Arthur Miller his characters illustrate the development of these traits, and societies reactions to those characters. The characters in “ The Crucible,” aren’t rational thinkers and jump to conclusions, they have problems with being honest, and each character sees the world differently.