Crucible Essay, Research Paper

The Crucible

In Arthur Miller s play The Crucible the main characters contribute to the chaos

that is aroused in Salem. Abigail Williams, John Proctor, Thomas Putnam and all

contribute to the chaos surrounding the trials. If it had not been for these people most of

the men and women who died never would have seen the horrible death they did. Abigail

was the main source of the craziness that went on in the town and John Proctor s

stubbornness didn t help much as well. Thomas Putnam was just a greedy money loving

man who had no respect for human life.

If it were not for Abigail Williams none of upheaval that took place never would

have gone on. Salem went into hysterics because of a girl who did not want to get into

trouble for something that she knew was forbidden. All she had to do was admit that she

had done something wrong and not blamed everyone else in the town for her wrong

doings, then everything would have been fine. Also, she caused problems with the other

girls. She was the main influence for the lies that were told by other girls who were

witched . She was the one who told that if they told anyone the truth about what went

on in the woods that she would personally kill them. Even when one of the girls tried to

stop by telling the courts the truth, Abby persuaded all the others into lying just so they

would not get into trouble. Abby was the main problem in the Salem witch trials, if she

had taken responsibility and not lied and gotten others into trouble, and killed, nothing

would have gone wrong and Salem could have been a normal town.

Thomas Putnam was another major influence in the hysterity that occurred in

Salem. He was a greedy and revengeful man, who thought of nothing but himself. He

turned in his neighbors for witch craft they never committed. Putnam had many of his

neighbors hung because he was hungry for land and money. He would make his daughter

cry witch on some of the men, so that they would be convicted of witchery and hung by

the courts. He forced his daughter to continue with something he knew was wrong just so

that he could uptain more land and riches for himself. He was also very scared that if the

lie did not continue and the secret was revealed that the girls were lying, that his daughter

Betty would be hung or punished. His wife also started some of the witch hype ,

because she wanted to find a person to blame for the death of her babies.

Reverend Hale also played a role in the destruction of Salem. When he arrived,

he thought that only he could tell who was a witch and who was innocent. Because of

Hale and his many facts about witches many innocent and good people were hung for

witchery. Rebecca Nurse was know by people in and out of Salem for her generous acts

of good, but because of her husband s fear and Hale s beliefs she was hung. Reverend

Hale came to Salem believing that he knew that answers and people believed him, so

when he started to name people left and right for witchery, the people believed it. What,

caused him to start the most ruches is when he back on his theories and decided that

maybe that himself and the people of Salem were wrong. When people found out that

Hale was thinking they were wrong, they turned on him and got even more hysterical.

The Crucible is a play about a town that went crazy because of the lies and stupid

theories by the citizens of Salem. If it had not been for the dishonesty and

misconceptions of three people none of this would ever have happened. The people of

Salem were led to comitt on of the simple senseless massacres of all times because they

were stubborn and could not look to obvious answer, the girls lied so they would not get

in trouble. Well all do it, just no one gets killed.