Abigail Williams is an evil, lying witch responsible for the deaths of innocent citizens in Salem, Massachusetts. In Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible the young, beautiful Abigail has an affair with married John Proctor. She will stop at nothing to get what she wants, including practicing witchcraft. Abigail is an obsessive, selfish, manipulative liar, who brings destruction wherever she goes. First and foremost, Abigail is obsessive. Evidence for this is shown when she refuses to believe that her relationship with John Proctor is over. In a heated argument she openly states, “You love me John Proctor, and whatever sin it is, you love me yet!”(Miller 146). Not only does this statement prove she is head over heels for John but that she does not care at all that he has a wife. She even tries to guilt the poor man into continuing the love affair. Abigail tries to get Elizabeth out of the picture by falsely accusing her of witchcraft, so she can have John to herself. Another time when Abigail is overly obsessive is when she accuses several people of witchcraft, to save her own hide. Her determination to have John leads to many arrests and hangings. Her targets are anyone one that is standing in the way of her getting John Proctor. Abigail has obsessive love and jealousy issues causing a delusional relationship with John. She also needs to be in control and engages in compulsive lying to manipulate those around her. Abigail is an amazing liar. Throughout the play there are
Abigail is a selfish and manipulative person which gives her the courage to do the things that she does. In act 3, Abigail says "Oh, Mary, this is a black art to change your shape. No, I cannot, I cannot stop my mouth; It's God's work I do" (III.115). Abigail claims that she is doing God’s work, but she is actually doing the devil's work because she is lying and forcing her friends to agree with her and go against Mary. She has the courage to go through with anything that comes to her mind, no matter what harm it could cause. “The girl, the Williams girl, Abigail Williams, sir. She sat to dinner in Reverend Parris's house tonight, and without word nor warning she falls to the floor. Like a struck beast, he says, and screamed a scream that a bull would weep to hear. And he goes to save her, and, stuck two inches in the flesh of her belly, he draw a needle out. And demanding of her how she come to be so stabbed, she --- testify it were your wife's familiar spirit pushed it in”(Act II.1282). This explains how Abigail is willing to go through with anything to be with John Proctor. She shows a monstrous amount of intrepidness just to do so. Abigail Williams has the courage to do anything when it comes to John Proctor. She stabs herself with a needle just to accuse Elizabeth of witchcraft.
Abigail’s behavior was most likely contributed to the traumatization as a child of the murder of her parents; that caused her to have a negative view of the world. After her parents death she was raised as an orphan, then later became the housekeeper for John and Elizabeth Proctor. Eventually, she was kicked out from the Proctor house by Elizabeth after having a sexual affair with John Proctor.Therefore, she had little
In Arthur Miller 's The Crucible, the main character Abigail Williams is to blame for the witch trials in Salem, Massachusetts, Abigail Williams remained a static character throughout the book. Abigail is a mean, deceitful and manipulative person who always wants her way; she has no remorse about who she hurts along her journey to get her want she wants.
If John Proctor wouldn't have cheated on Elizabeth, Abigail's obsession would have been a crush and probably gone after away, Since John felt the same about Abigail he made that mistake of touching her. John explained to her that she was a mistake it was never meant to happen that it was never going to happen again either he wanted to be pretending it never happened. Abigail had the opposite opinion about that, She obviously got upset and wanted him to herself she had Tituba and other girls from the village and do witchcraft it was all fun and games until she drank chicken blood. Later on Abigail accuses random people of being witches and one day John was called into town and it was Abigail and John alone she told him she could stop this if he were to go with her and leave his wife he refused and she forced herself on him and John threw her off not wanting to make the same mistake over
Abigail wants to get rid of Elizabeth, who she describes as John Proctor’s “sniveling envious wife” (Optional scene Pg. 158)! One can infer how Abigail is jealous and is doing anything to steel Elizabeth’s place in Proctor’s bed. It reaches a degree were Abigail is lies so much she starts to believe her lies, and stabs herself in the stomach with a pin to blame Elizabeth for attempting to kill her. She later goes on trying to convince Proctor that “the jab your wife gave me’s not healed yet” (Optional scene Pg. 155). The revenge that Abigail is seeking to find is directly related to the theme of vengeance that is profound throughout the play. Additionally, other people in Salem, such as the Putnam’s, take advantage of the crisis to help achieve their
C. J. Partridge points out in Readings on Arthur Miller, that “at the height of her mass hysteria, she is a creature of supreme arrogance” (Siebold 156). Her ability to successfully deceive others gives her such power that she feels a deal of great superiority. With Abigail’s arrogant nature, her innermost ideas become unreasonable and selfish. Partridge suggests that Abigail’s power has gone as far too almost tear apart John and Elizabeth’s marriage. Carl Rollyson suggests through his explanation “Abigail senses that the community of Salem, Massachusetts, is uneasy, that it suffers from societal tensions” (Rollyson 1).
Abigail was driven by jealousy when John Proctor slept with her and then moved on and married Elizabeth. Elizabeth was known for telling the truth no matter what. Abigail was outraged and was ready to murder Elizabeth. When Abigail was performing these pretending acts, people were starting to believe what they were seeing, they started to believe Abigail. Abigail was only doing this because she was doing whatever she could to get Elizabeth accused as a witch. During this time of mad accusing, 20 innocent people were hanged just because of false accusations. “ I have a sense for heat, John, and yours has drawn me to my window, and I have seen you looking up, burning in your loneliness. Do you tell me you’ve never looked up at my window” (Miller, 23)? Abigail is trying to get into John Proctor’s head. She wants John to join her side and get rid of Elizabeth, together. She feels that John loves her but he doesn’t and that's why she is driven by jealousy. John did not give into Abigail’s
She thinks that if she gets rid of Proctor's wife that her and procter can be together. John has told Abigail that this is not the case and that he loves his wife and will not leave Elizabeth. Abigail decides to off her anyway just because she has the power to do so. When one is sixteen years old and the fate of people's lives are at their hands this is just too much power and (especially if she is jealous of the life that is at stake). This power that she has corrupts Abigail's already corrupted mind ino just doing whatever she wants. When Abigail accuses John's wife Elizabeth of being a witch and the whole town just goes along with it, (even though there are rumors of an affair). The whole town turning a blind eye about the affair just shows the reader how much power she has over the town. It also shows that she is using the power for personal gain definitely not for the good of the
After having an affair with John Proctor, she couldn’t accept not being without him. Abigail also admires “how such a strong man may let such a sickly wife” like Elizabeth be unaware of the affair she had with John Proctor(act1pg#). As a result to the affair, Proctor is trying to rebuild his marriage with his wife. Abigail continues to intervene in John Proctors marriage and attempts to manipulate Proctor so he would confess his love for her. Proctor admits his love for her, but does not continue his affection because Abigail seeps of vengeance for other individuals. He portrays her “as a lump of vanity” who thinks to dance on his “wife’s grave!”(act 3). For her own selfish desires, Abigail accuses Elizabeth of witchcraft and tries to intentionally sabotage her. She does this for the purpose of her own selfish and fictitious relationship that she has with Proctor. Abigail believes she has the capability to influence Proctor, but her egoistic actions to win his undefining love makes her appear as the criminal in the
Abigail’s lust for John Proctor is one of the causes of the witch-hunt. She quotes early in the story saying, “I have a sense of heat, John, and yours had drawn me to my window, and I have seen you looking up, burning in your loneliness. Do you tell me
In “The Crucible” the story has taught us about how great and powerful fear can easily take over one another and show how people turn against one another just to protect themselves. One of the characters in the story has shown a great example of this and you can see the great evil that is inside of this person who just lets good innocent people die to protect themselves. Cruel and selfish is what you think or maybe it is the other way around for you. Maybe you think you got to do whatever you got to do to keep going in this puzzle of life. Yes that is true but in this story a girl named Abigail Williams deserves to take all the blame that needs to be taken for all of what has been done in the little town of Salem.
Within today’s society, an individual’s morals determines how one is scrutinized, judged, and reprimanded. In Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible, Abigail Williams is a character with compelling moral principles. Abigail’s disoriented moral constitution allows the theme, the detrimental effects of mass hysteria, to be constantly reassured throughout the play. Through the egotistical, manipulative, and deceitful rhetoric of Abigail Williams, Arthur Miller is successful in conveying how the spread of misinformation can tear apart a small town.
Abigail had many flaws throughout the story. One of her flaws includes lust. Abigail was involved in a secret affair with John Proctor, who happened to be married to Elizabeth Proctor. Abigail illustrated lust by telling John, “John- I am waitin’ for you every night.” This suggests that Abigail does have something secret going on with John. Abigail also says, “I know how you clutched my back behind your house and sweated like a stallion whenever I come near!” This justifies that they have a relationship because she told John that he
Abigail is a highly jealous character, concentrating her jealousy on Elizabeth Proctor. This jealousy is driven by lust and her desire for John Proctor. Abigail served as a servant in the Proctor household and after an affair with her husband John, Elizabeth fired her. She still resents Elizabeth for this as she is still in love with John. She clearly says to John, "You loved me, John Proctor, and whatever sin it is, you love me yet!" Abigail is still in love with John and she assumes the converse. Her love for John only causes her resentment for Elizabeth to strengthen. She hates John Proctor's wife and in her conniving ways she attempts to inspire the same views of Elizabeth in John's mind. Saying things to him such as, "She is blackening my name in the village! She is telling lies about me, She is a cold, sniveling woman." Abigail fabricates stories in attempt to steel John from Elizabeth. She is a manipulative liar that does and says as she pleases in order to get what she wants.
In the play The Crucible by Arthur Miller, Abigail Williams and Mrs. Putnam are are the sources of the witchcraft mysteries because they are able to use their manipulating witchcraft skills to throw the blame onto their enemies. Abigail Williams hates Elizabeth Proctor, for she had an affair with her husband,John, and still has lustful feelings towards him. Abigail used to work for the Proctor family, but was immediately thrown out because of her relationship with John, of which Elizabeth has no idea existed. Abigail believes Elizabeth hates her and calls her a “bitter woman, a lying, cold, sniveling woman” (12). This of course shows tensions between Elizabeth and Abigail. Abigail even admits she would do ANYTHING to get of Elizabeth, perhaps