Salem Witch Trials In The Crucible

Arthur Miller’s The Crucible focuses on the Salem Witch Trials along with the pointing of fingers that went along with it. Miller wrote this to reflect upon what was occurring during the Red Scare in the 1940’s and 1950’s. The Crucible is written in an ironic and cynical tone mocking the Red Scare.

Arthur Miller's the Crucibles tells us about the Salem witch trials which occurred in Massachusetts in 1692. Miller has used many details that have

"The Crucible" which was written by Arthur Miller, is a shocking look into the events of a tragic period early in history that America will not likely forget. The setting of "The Crucible" is that it takes place in the Puritan community of Salem, Massachusetts in 1692. The story revolves around the Salem Witch Trials. John Proctor is facing a moral dilemma. It turns out that Abigail Williams, Proctor's former servant girl and mistress, along with several other young girls, were caught out in the woods dancing naked and practicing witchcraft.

The Salem Witch Trails were a dark period, where adults took the words of kids with no evidence over the accused. This time is one of the examples of America’s Red Scare; when many innocent lives were being taken one after another over the rumors of witchcraft. These structure of events put into a book named The Crucibles, written by an American playwright, an author in 1953 named Arthur Miller. He describes the trials that took place in the Massachusetts Bay Colony during the 1692-1693 period.

Look at this first graph. See how 225 Salem people agree that these trials are all fake. I agree with them too. All these accusing and witnesses are merely doing this because they can, or because they are trying to scare you. This poll clearly showed that people kept their heads on (no pun intended) through the panic of the moment. In fact, many still think of most the accused are good christian people. The arrest and execution of Rebecca Nurse and John Proctor pumped up the number of people who doubted the theories of witchcraft in Salem. For example, Reverend Hale realized the dishonesty of Abigail Williams and her gang of impostors. He quit the bogus court and turned his own way to save the accused, even if his ways are strange. You see,

“As the most dangerous inmates, the witches were kept in the dungeons. These were perpetually dark, bitterly cold, and so damp that water ran down the walls” (Delusion of Satan: The Full Story of the Salem Witch Trials). Throughout the late 1600s, the accusations of witchcraft in Salem became a common thread. Over 200 people were accused and more than twenty were hanged. The idea of empowerment was altered when girls of Salem made profound accusations against well known people of the town. The Crucible, written by Arthur Miller, portrays the empowerment of characters that forever affected the lives of people in Salem through rhetorical questions, pathos, and imagery.

Arthur Miller’s The Crucible takes place during the Salem witch trials of 1692. The book tells the events surrounding said trials and the motives of the people involved in the executions of John Proctor, Rebecca Nurse, and Martha Corey, epitomizing the book's title.

In Arthur Miller’s the Crucible, which in located in Salem,Massachusetts had a troublesome time called the Salem Witch Trials, it was a time of murder and assumptions based on people’s thoughts of their neighbors it had to deal with Witchcraft. Relationships have changed threw this time some for good and some for bad.

Mr. Alden asked me if I could have a conversation with two of his students that were involved in a fight during dismissal time, yesterday. He informed me that the mother of one of the students (Fares) wanted to talk to the other student involved (Salem), but he didn’t allow it to happen. He asked me during the flag ceremony and later when they went back to class, Fares mom was upstairs and talked to Salem, as soon as he saw that happening he stopped it.

The Crucible was based in 1692 in and around the town of Salem, Massachusetts, USA. The Salem witch-hunt was view as one of the strangest and most horrendous chapters in the human history. People that were prosecuted were all innocent and their deaths were all due to false accusation of people’s ridiculous belief in superstition and their paranoia. The Puritans in those times were very strict in personal habits and morality; swearing, drunkenness and gambling would be punished. The people of Salem believed in the devil and thought that witchcraft should be hunted out.

The Crucible by Arthur Miller is a famous play which was written in the early 1950’s. The Crucible is a play based upon the events in 1692, which led to the ‘Salem Witch Trials’, a series of hearings before local magistrates to prosecute over 150 people accused of witchcraft. This was due to the hysteria caused by a group of girls accusing innocent people of witch craft. The play was set in Salem, Massachusetts between February 1692 and May 1693. Salem was a very isolated and puritanical community, so their biggest fear was the devil and witchcraft. A person being accused of witchcraft was the worst thing possible in this society.

These days, dressing up like a witch for Halloween is very normal. The year was 1962 when Salem Massachusetts was forever cemented in history because of the Salem witch trials. People accused of witch craft were imprisoned or hung and in one occasion a person was pressed to death. I can only imagine what the people of Salem were going through those days. There was a fear in the entire town because you couldn’t trust anyone. It became neighbor against neighbor as the small town was torn apart and people didn’t know who to trust. One of the most important persons from these times was Cotton Mather. He was an accomplished author, researcher, and preacher who worker under his father at Boston’s North Church. In “From the Wonders of the Invisible World” Mather writes about the Salem Witch Trials and what happened when some people recanted their testimony of being witches.

The Crucible by Arthur Miller is an interpretation of the Salem witch trials of 1692 in Puritan Massachusetts in which religion, justice, individuality and dignity play a vital role. These factors define the characteristics of many of the most significant characters in the play. Some of them being John Proctor, Rebecca Nurse, Reverend Hale, Danforth and many others. The Salem witch trials were a result of the lack of expression of individuality and the fact that no individual could expect justice from the majority culture as a result of the deterioration of human dignity in the Puritan society of Salem.

The Salem witch trials demonstrate the opposite approach to gaining land and power from those on the frontier. They began when several girls accused women of witchcraft to cover up their own crimes. As accusations and counter accusations flew, most of Salem was encircled in the mess. A court was convened, and sentenced 19 people to death, many of them for not confessing. But beneath the lessons about witch trials is another story about the struggles of those on the frontier. The accusers were predominantly from the western portion of Salem, Salem Village, and the accused were from the east. Salem Village was growing and seeking greater independence and power. Meanwhile, the population boom in New England and the fact that non landowning men could not vote lead to powerful incentives. Accusing someone to gain their land, and so wealth and status, would be sensible. The incentives at play for those on the frontier led to a series of actions that would seem perplexing, but were reasonable for those taking them. But the outsiders in society failed in this conflict too. There was little change in their status in society, and the accusers even lost social status, as was shown in the Crucible. Meanwhile, the accused and the relatives of the executed were compensated by the government. In the end, the Salem Witch Trials did not result in a victory for outsiders in society, but only in further elite consolidation of power.

Have you ever had a finger pointed at you unfairly? If so, how would that feel? Despite being a country that has fairness and justice as core values, the United States has been and is currently a neutral witness to such events, which has caused irreparable damage. When these events have occurred in the U.S., the targets were usually a certain group of people who were highly feared in society. Targeting a group in this manner was known as a “witch hunt.” In Arthur Miller's play, The Crucible, he discusses how a small suspicion of witchcraft in Salem, Massachusetts during colonial times ultimately escalated to hysteria and destruction of innocent life. While the Salem Witch Trials were the most quintessential example of a “witch hunt”, similar instances sadly reappeared in different forms during the 20th century.