The Crucible.

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Emily Kalbag ‘The crucible’ Draft.04/05/2007

In the year 1692, in the small Massachusetts village of Salem, some village girls fell ill, falling victim to hallucinations and strange, unexplainable behaviour. In the Puritan New England, startling incidents were often blamed on the devil. Soon the girls, and then other residents of Salem, began to accuse other villagers of associating with the devil. The Massachusetts government and judicial system, heavily influenced by religion, rolled into action. Within a few weeks, dozens of people were in jail on charges of witchcraft. By the time the ‘craze’ had finished, in late August 1692, nineteen people had been condemned and hanged for witchcraft.

The Crucible is set in a village. Here there is no room for variance from social normality, because a non- conformist private life in these times acted as a threat not only to the public but also to God and religion.  says in Act III, "a person is either with this court or he must be counted against it."

In the Crucible hysteria is a major theme. It can participate in ripping apart a community. Hysteria overcomes logic and lets people to believe that their neighbours are committing strange and unbelievable crimes–involving the devil, killing babies, and making love potions. The most obvious case is Abigail, who uses the situation to accuse  Proctor of witchcraft and have her sent to jail. The ruthless  gains vengeance on  by getting , Francis's wife, convicted of the murders of 's babies. Others prosper on the hysteria as well:  reinforces his position in the village, by making scapegoats of people like Proctor who question his authority.

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There is little symbolism within The Crucible, but the play is symbolic of the Marxism paranoia that spread through America in the 1950s. There are similar points between House Un-American Activities Committee's getting rid of suspected communists during this time and the seventeenth-century witch-hunt that Miller portrays in The Crucible. As with the ‘witches’ of Salem, suspected Communists were encouraged to confess their crimes and to "name names," identifying others who were involved in the same things. As far as is known there were no witches in Salem at this time, although there were Communists in 1950s America. McCarthyism extremes ...

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