The Reality of the Salem Witch Trails In Arthur Miller's The Crucible, Abigail Williams plays a very important role in the play. In fact without her there would not be a Salem witch trial in Salem, Massachusetts. Abigail is the source of all the hysteria in attempt to defend herself from her crimes. She is a mean and vindictive person who always wants her way, no matter who she hurts. Throughout the play her lies and accusations and cause many people there lives , but she seemed to never care for any of them except John Proctor who she had an affair with several months prior to the beginning of the play. Abigail is definitely the antagonist of the village. She tells lies, manipulates her friends and the entire town, and eventually sends nineteen innocent people to their deaths. Abigail Williams is Selfish and …show more content…
Confident which lead to the mass killing of innocent people. (THESIS STATEMENT) Firstly, Aggressiveness of Abigail is demonstrated by threating the girl that she will torture them if they speak a word.
She manipulates her friends by treating them with her past experience of murder. ”Let either of you breathe a word, or the edge of a word, about the other things, and I will come to you in the black of some terrible night and I will bring a pointy reckoning that will shudder you,”Act I”. During this point in the play they had been caught doing the ritual in the wood and now the town people know. She put fear into the girls like she was the leader of them and shows aggressiveness by doing whatever she wants to get her way done. Secondly, Abigail is manipulative during the trail she was acting out to act as if she was witched. (INSERT QUOTE). She started acting out and repeating what Tituba said and saying she was torturing from her other spirit that she sent. When she was doing it the other girls joined in with her because they were scared she was going to do if they didn’t. John knew it was all an act but he couldn’t say because, he was not supposed to be around Abagail alone then his wife would know that he was committing
adultery. Lastly, Selfishness of Abigail is demonstrated by her lack of empathy for all the innocent people falsely arrested. When Tituba named all the people they asked that were witches Abigail did not even seem to care as long the trouble was off of her. (INSERT Quote). This shows how selfish Abagail is a lot of innocent people died because she didn’t want to take the punishment. Also her uncle had a feeling that it was an act but he couldn’t jeopardize his reputation as a reverend. Mostly Abagail is self-center she is only worried about herself and her appearance toward the town. In conclusion, Overall Abagail is a manipulative, aggressive, and selfish person. In this play her only cares about herself and has no disregard for others. Her act of foolishness killed a lot of innocent people and even got John killed the person she wanted to do the ritual to get. In the play she is the one of the most evil character because she caused all of this to happen to her friend and even Tituba the slave who was jailed because of her wanted to the rituals. Abagail is on the most unbelieveable character in this play and she should have been more honest about what she did so innocent people wouldn’t have been killed.
A motivation can be described as a character having a reason to behave or act in a particular way. Someone or something can be someone's motivation. A child obeys its parents to avoid punishment or a clerk works overtime so that he can afford a better car are examples of motivation. In The Crucible by Arthur Miller, characters illustrate several types of motivations. Throughout the play, Abigail is motivated by jealousy, power, and attention.
May it please the court, counsel, members of the jury; this is a case of conspiracy of the murder of Elizabeth Proctor. In the spring of the year 1692, Abigail Williams was accused of plotting the murder of Elizabeth Proctor.
Abigail's necessity for revenge makes her threaten the young ladies into following her idea of deception. “Let either of you breathe a word,” Abigail threatens, “or the edge of a word about the other things, and I will come to you in the black of some terrible night and bring a pointy reckoning that will shudder you”(835). Abigail knows that all the girls in the woods fear her to death. Which made the witch trials easier for her to get by. Another thing is that Abigail ends her affair with John Proctor to try to get revenge on him. “A man may think God
In every family, there is one child that is always very misleading and evil, and besides that, they get away with everything that they do that is unsound. The certain person in the family may break on of you mom’s favorite plate, and then end up placing the blame on you, and then persuades your parents that he or she is telling the true. Abigail Williams is the poor duplicate of that sibling or relative. She influences everyone that she is an innocent teenage girl, but that is not the case throughout the play. In the play, The Crucible, by Arthur Miller, Abigail is the bona fide misleading and evil teenage girl.
During the early years of the colonies, there was a mad witch hunt striking the heart of Salem. Anger, reputation, and even religion play an important part during the play of The Crucible, written by Arthur Miller. The author allows us to witness the vivid idea of the hysteria taking place in Salem, Massachusetts, and why it was so vulnerable during the time.
First, In the book The Crucible Abigail Williams is the vengeful, manipulative, and a liar. She seems to be uniquely gifted at spreading death and destruction wherever she goes. She has a sense of how to manipulate others and gain control over them. All these things add up to make her one good antagonist with a dark side. In Act I, her skills at manipulation are on full display. When she's on the brink of getting busted for witchcraft, she skillfully manages to pin the whole thing on Tituba and several of Salems other second class citizens. Also since Abigail's affair with John Proctor, she's been out to get Elizabeth, his wife. She convinced Tituba to put a curse on Elizabeth, hoping to get rid of her and take
to dancing round a fire in the woods but she says that it was not
In Arthur Miller's The Crucible, the main character Abigail Williams is to blame for the 1692 witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts. Abigail is a mean and vindictive person who always wants her way, no matter who she hurts. Through out the play her accusations and lies cause many people pain and suffering, but she seemed to never care for any of them except John Proctor, whom she had an affair with seven months prior to the beginning of the play. John Proctor and his wife Elizabeth used to employ Abigail, until Elizabeth found out the affair and threw Abigail out. Although John told Abigail that the affair was over and he would never touch her again, she tried desperately to rekindle their romance. "Abby, I may think of you softly from time to time. But I will cut off my hand before I'll ever reach for you again." (Page 23) She claimed that she loved John and that he loved her. Before the play began, Abigail tried to kill Elizabeth with a curse. She thought that if Elizabeth were dead John would marry her. Further into the play, Abigail accused Elizabeth of witchcraft. She saw Marry Warren, the Proctor's servant, making a poppet. Mary put a needle into the doll, and Abigail used that for her accusation. She stabbed herself with a needle and claimed that Elizabeth's soul had done it. Although Abigail claimed she loved John, she may have just loved the care and attention he gave her. John cared for her like no one else had. In a way he could be described as somewhat of a father figure to her. When Abigail was just a child, she witnessed her parents' brutal murders. "I saw Indians smash my dear parent's heads on the pillow next to mine..." (page 20) After her traumatic experience, she was raised by her uncle, Reverend Parris, who is somewhat of a villain. In the play it was written, "He (Parris) was a widower with no interest in children, or talent with them." (Page 3) Parris regarded children as young adults who should be "thankful for being permitted to walk straight, eyes slightly lowered, arms at the sides, and mouths shut until bidden to speak." (Page 4) Therefore, it is obvious to see that Abigail grew up without any love or nurturing.
Comparison of Elizabeth Proctor with Abigail Williams in Arthur Miller's The Crucible Abigail Williams and Elizabeth Proctor, the leading female characters in 'The Crucible'. Both show determination in order to get what they want. Abigail, a cunning girl that is out for revenge, feels she has superiority over many of the other characters even though she is only a young girl. Elizabeth's character portrays a wife in distress after she finds out about her husband's affair, yet she still has courage throughout the play. She shows determination when she is in need of strength to keep her going, after Abigail accused her of witchcraft.
It is clear that Abigail Williams is portrayed as the antagonist in Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, taking place in the late 1600s in Salem, Massachusetts and based on the witch-trials therein. She serves as a catalyst for the witch trials by falsely accusing innocent townspeople with the intent of maintaining the position of power she gains from them. Due to the transparency of her actions, Abigail’s ulterior motives are also distinguishable. Certain effeminate stereotypes are presented throughout the course of the play. One of which, being that of the immoral, husbandless woman, Abigail embodies. Slave to emotion and motivated by lust, Abigail falls
Abigail Williams is manipulative and wants everything to go her way. She is the main character and causes trouble everywhere she goes. The Salem Witch Trials is about hearings and prosecutions of people who were accused of witchcraft. In The Crucible Abigail is a no good villain. Abigail first commits adultery with Elizabeth’s husband.
her selfish and evil ways, causes the destruction of many people in the town of
In conclusion Abigail is the problem in the play The Crucible and I believe that if she wasn’t in it they wouldn’t have had half the problems they did. She caused almost every single bad thing that happened in the play. She is a terrible, mean, rotten person who I believe should have
Abigail Williams the main character in The Crucible by Arthur Miller draws the interest of the reader as she is a wicked, confident girl who lies to get what she wants and defends her name and her life.
She is the niece of Reverend Parris and the cousin of Betty Parris; she used to work as a servant for the Proctors, before being sent away by Elizabeth Proctor; she is the ringleader of the “afflicted” girls. Abigail Williams was the initial instigator of the witch hunt in Salem in Arthur Miller’s play The Crucible. She lied and accused others of witchcraft in order to save herself. During the Salem Witch Trials over 200 people were accused of witchcraft and 20 were executed (Blumberg). Abigail Williams is a member of a strict Puritan society. Witnessing her parents being murdered right in front of her, being forced to live with her selfish inconsiderate uncle, and having a love for a man she