It can be further argued that the play and the events within it are seen through Proctor’s eyes. Although at no point is the play written as if by Proctor in the first person, the reader, partly due to what is included and partly due to how we are encouraged to feel about the events and characters, sees the play as Proctor might. For example, Miller clearly encourages us not to see any truth in the allegations of witchcraft. Never once does the audience see a character under the influence of any other forces. In act one when Hale is interrogating Tituba, we as a modern audience can stand back and see that she is being blackmailed and encouraged into confessing:
“Tituba: I have no power on this child, Sir.
Hale: You most certainly do, and you will free her from it now!”
In this instance Tituba cannot resist because she is merely a slave and Hale is her
superior. We, free from the restraints of society as they knew it, can stand back and
see the injustice that is so prevalent in Salem. In this sense we share a viewpoint with
John Proctor. He, in his isolation from society, can see conservative Salem with all its
travesties quite clearly, as can we, the modern audience. This isolation derives
in part from his constant conflict with other members of Salem society such as Parris
and Hale. In turn, the root of this conflict is in Proctor’s broadly different values,
unlike those held by the community as a whole. Proctor for example, refuses to accept
the allegations of witchcraft at face value, while everyone else is all too happy to mix
rumours and truth. Hence, Proctor acts as the rational staple of Salem, the eyes if you
like, through which a modern audience can see and make sense of it all.
Proctor’s centrality to the plot of 'The Crucible' is vital as far as Miller’s underlying
meaning is concerned. If Proctor does indeed represent Miller, then he must be
centrally involved in the play in order that the audience may see all aspects of it.
Indeed, Proctor’s journey through the events of the play is the audience’s own. As the
play draws to a close, so too does Proctor’s life. He is driven away to his death,
leaving Elizabeth on stage as the final curtain falls. Thus, Proctor’s battle between
truth and life provides the moral to Miller’s tale. As Proctor chooses the path of a
truthful and virtuous death – the path we see as morally right – the audience sees
Proctor to have triumphed over the hypocrisy all around him, hence proving his
choice to be right and providing a moral for the story.
However, in order for Proctor to function properly in his role as the eyes of the audience, it is vital that the audience sympathises with his plight. Were Proctor made out to be a bad character, then whatever path he ultimately chose would similarly be made out to be the wrong such choice. This would completely change the meaning of the play, making it appear to support the concept of the witch trials. Miller had to ensure that Proctor maintained in the eyes of the audience the status of the tragic hero – someone they could empathise with, sympathise with, and respect equally.
There are a number of means by which Miller ensures that the audience comes to like and sympathise with Proctor. For example, in a play which opens with crying and conflict, Proctor is the only character who openly laughs (act one, page 25) making him seem a relaxed and likeable character, and instantly separating him from the anguish and hysteria of the other characters. He refuses to accept others’ truths, preferring to make up his own mind, and hence does not collapse into the panic that others are all too ready to succumb to. For example in act two, while Mary happily and readily believes the rumours of Goody Osburn’s association with witchcraft, Proctor calls for “the proof, the proof” – he will not accept rumours, but needs evidence. This provides a telling insight into Proctor’s attitude to justice; he will not simply accept allegations, suggesting him to be a very rational man. The audience is naturally drawn to his calm, cheerful and positive attitude.
Equally effective is Proctor’s part in the plot of the play. Because Proctor is the central character in the play, and because the audience sees its events through his eyes, we are required to side with him. We know Proctor to be “powerful of body, even-tempered … respected” and these are characteristics we as an audience look up to, leading us to greatly respect Proctor. This is bound to result in the audience siding with him over other characters. In many cases these characters are portrayed as ‘bad’ from the start. In the case of Parris he is described as having “cut a villainous path” and we are told that “there is very little good to be said for him”. Proctor on the other hand is clearly portrayed as a character worthy of our admiration. His constant opposition to and disagreement with characters such as Parris throughout the play (their argument in act one, pages 24 and 25, for example) makes proctor out to be the ‘good-guy’ of the piece.
However, were it not for the introduction of the image of Proctor as a tragic hero, this respectability may lead him to become rather a cold character, barring the audience from identifying with him. Instead, Proctor’s all-too-common flaw gives him a kind of humanity that the audience may recognise in themselves. Proctor’s only real ‘failing’ in the eyes of society is his lust for Abigail. While now, in the 21st century, lust may be more or less freely admitted and recognised as part of the human condition, in puritanical Salem it was a most terrible sin. Hence we can understand, to a certain extent, the battle that Proctor is having with himself, and therefore we desire to help him through it with our sympathy.
Our recognition of Proctor as an ultimately good man makes our sympathy for him even more acute when taken in context with our concept of Salem as a community. We, like Proctor, see Salem as a rather extreme puritanical and conservative society and the characters within it such as Hale similarly. We see all too clearly the mad hysteria that develops in Salem, but we are not presented with any evidence to support it, as detailed in the example of Hale’s interrogation of Tituba presented earlier on. We are further encouraged to see Hale as a bad character. In act two he visits Elizabeth and John in their home. We are told that appears “quite suddenly, as though from the air” and that he is “different now – drawn a little, and there is a quality of deference, even of guilt, about his manner now”. This description adds an air of mystery to him – he seems subversive and breeds paranoia, which is bound to encourage the audience to dislike him. This unpleasantness about him rubs off on the characters who side with him such as Parris, Danforth and Abigail, and hence rubs off on the society that gets caught up in his hysterical witch-hunt. Similarly to Proctor therefore, we feel alienated from this society, so different to our own.
So while characters such as Hale may be portrayed as popular in the community, and therefore as good citizens following the teachings of their society, the audience sees Proctor as a good man. Furthermore, as the audience comes to dislike this society more and more, partly due to Hale’s influence upon it, and as the events of the play become more serious, our disgust with Salem as a society grows. This leads us to side even more with the characters that are portrayed as ‘good people’ (not only Proctor, but those accused of witchcraft more generally such as Rebecca Nurse and Elizabeth Proctor) and against the ‘good citizens’. This is simply due to the fact that the ‘good citizens’ chose to distinguish themselves from the ‘good people’ in the eyes of the audience by accusing them of witchcraft, thus forcing us to side against them.
However, the audience’s sympathy with Proctor is perhaps not absolute. In his relationship/interaction with Elizabeth, we may find a darker, less appealing side to Proctor. When we first meet her, Elizabeth is “softly singing to the children”. She obeys John’s orders, seeming mild, sweet and gentle. This serves to instantly ingratiate her with the audience. But similarly, she gains our sympathy. She has the air of a repressed housewife. In obeying John’s every command, Elizabeth appeals to the hearts of the modern liberal audience living in an age of comparative equality. Everything down to the way she laments “Pray God. I hurt my heart to strip her, poor rabbit” makes her ever more sweet and sensitive and worthy of sympathy in the eyes of the audience. Because of the audience’s sympathies with Elizabeth, when Proctor begins to grow angry and shout at her, for the first time we are encouraged to side against Proctor. Elizabeth, seeming weak and sensitive plays on our sympathies, so when John shouts “Woman … I’ll not have your suspicion any more”, the audience sees her as the victim of the ‘bully’, John.
Even then however, John manages to redeem himself. Elizabeth’s sweetness does seem to have an effect on him. Eventually, he recognises Elizabeth for the good woman she is, and when he comes to resolve his inner battle between truth and life, he values her opinion above all others. He appears therefore, to be a man of some compassion. He begs her to judge him, something that he had rejected bitterly before then, and was the source of their original argument. In his own words “You are a – marvel, Elizabeth”.
In Proctor’s struggle at the end of the play – his choice between a virtuous death and a haunted life – we see open, frank and emotional expressions of his goodness and compassion. Indeed, it is here that we see the true evidence that John Proctor really is a good man. Here, for the first time, he openly recognises his flaws – “I cannot mount the gibbet a saint … Nothing’s spoiled by giving them this lie that wasn’t rotten long before”. The audience now recognises him as a man of great humanity, who will own up to his past sins. Furthermore, his benevolence shines through in his recognition of Elizabeth as a better person than he. This is most prominently displayed in his desperation to be judged by her. He recognises her goodness and begs forgiveness, and when she sullies her own name his pain is most apparent:
“Proctor (In great pain): Enough, enough –
Elizabeth (Now pouring out her heart): Better you should know me!
Proctor: I will not hear it! I know you!”
Never before has Proctor used such emotion as this, denoted by the short sentences, exclamation marks and short bursts of pained speech. It is clear that he loves Elizabeth above all other things, and would willingly die for her to think better of him. He is a man of true compassion and love.
But most revealing of his good nature is Proctor’s ultimate choice. When it comes down to it, he cannot lie. As he tries to give the confession, he has great trouble in physically saying it. His jaws lock, we are told, as if God himself were intervening to stop a good Christian from sullying his name. His confession is short, pained and brief. He cannot bear to elaborate, simply uttering “I did … He did” in answer to the charges against him. It is too much for this good man. He cannot darken his soul to save his life. He would rather die a good and honest Christian, than live a lie and stoop so low as those who interrogate and imprison him. It is here that he proves himself truly heroic, as he rises above the hypocrisy of Salem and dies a martyr to the cause of good and truth, and this he recognises himself – “I do think I see some shred of goodness in John Proctor.”
Clearly then, John Proctor is absolutely the central character of 'The Crucible'. He is purposely detached from Salem society and moulded into the key to a play with a deeper underlying meaning. In many ways he represents Miller himself, and shares a viewpoint with the modern audience, providing a window into a very different world. In order to do this it is vital that the audience sympathises entirely with his plight. His respectable and likeable character draws the audience to him, before Miller pits both him and us against the misguided witch-hunters – Miller’s own House Un-American Activities Committee. We side and sympathise with Proctor, just as Miller requires us to side and sympathise with him, before a greater evil.
