The Crucible - summary.

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Act One Summary: 

 

Miller prefaces the action of the play with a historical description of the Puritan society in which the play is set and an analysis of the Salem witch trials. To the rest of the European world, the inhabitants of Massachusetts were considered fanatics who shipped out products of slowly increasing quantity and value. At this time the town of Salem, established only forty years before, is barely more than a small village. The Puritans lived a strict and somber way of life, and had a predilection for interfering in others' affairs to guard against immorality. The Puritans carried with them an air of innate resistance and believed that they held in their hands "the candle that would light the world," a belief that modern Americans still share. Miller claims that the Salem tragedy developed from a paradox: for good purposes, even high purposes, the people of Salem developed a theocracy to keep the community together, but all organization is grounded on the idea of exclusion. The witch hunt was not mere oppression, but also an opportunity for everyone to express publicly his guilt and sins under the cover of accusations against the victims.

The play is set in Salem, Massachusetts in the spring of 1692, and the first act begins in a small upper bedroom of the home of Reverend Samuel Parris, who kneels in prayer at the bed of his daughter, Betty, a ten year old girl who lays inert in bed. Parris is a man in his middle forties who believes himself to be perpetually persecuted. He has no talent with children, for he sees then as nothing more than small adults.

Tituba, Rev. Parris' slave from Barbados, enters the room, frightened and worried that Betty may die, but Parris makes her leave. Abigail Williams, the niece of Rev. Parris, also enters; she is a strikingly beautiful, seventeen year old orphan with a talent for deception. She brings with her Susanna Walcott, who tells Rev. Parris that Dr. Griggs can find no cure for Betty's ailment. Parris claims that he has sent for Reverend Hale of Beverly, who will confirm the possibility of an unnatural cause of Betty's illness, but he orders Susanna to say nothing of unnatural causes to others. Abigail warns Parris that there are rumors of witchcraft and that the parlor is packed with people, but Parris tells her that he cannot explain that he found his daughter and niece dancing like heathen in the forest. Abigail admits to dancing and is willing to accept the punishment, but will not admit to witchcraft. Parris warns Abigail that he has enemies who will use this against him, and claims that he saw a dress lying on the grass and someone naked running through the trees. He thinks that Tituba was screeching gibberish when he found the girls, but Abigail says that it is merely Barbados songs. Parris demands to know that Abigail has a good reputation, for there are rumors that her former employee, Goody Proctor, thinks Abigail is corrupt, but Abigail calls Goody Proctor a gossiping liar.

Mrs. Ann Putnam and Mr. Thomas Putnam, a forty-five year old woman and her husband, enter; she claims that Betty's illness is certainly a stroke of hell. There are rumors that Betty was flying over the Ingersoll's barn, according to Mrs. Putnam. Their daughter is also sick, and they assume witchcraft is the cause. Thomas Putnam is a man with many grievances and a vindictive nature; he is a deeply embittered man who feels himself the intellectual superior of all others in Salem. Mrs. Putnam admits that she sent her daughter, Ruth, to Tituba, for Tituba knows how to speak to the dead; she did this to learn who murdered her seven children during their infancy. Mercy Lewis, an eighteen year old girl who is the Putnam's servant, visits Betty. She discusses Ruth's sickness with Abigail, and suggests beating Betty to snap her out of her illness. Abigail tells Ruth that Rev. Parris knows that Tituba conjured Ruth's sisters and that Parris saw Mercy naked. Mary Warren, another young girl, enters, panicking because the town is talking witchcraft. Betty suddenly sits up and cries that Abigail drank blood to kill Goody Proctor. Abigail threatens the other girls: if they say anything other than that they danced and Tituba conjured Ruth Putnam's sisters, Abigail will do violence upon them.

John Proctor, a farmer with a biting way with hypocrites, enters. He is a man who can expose foolishness, but also a sinner. He orders Mary Warren, his servant, to go home, while Mercy leaves as well. Abigail speaks tenderly to him and speaks about their affair, but Proctor states definitively that he will cut off his hand before he will ever reach for her again. As they hear the people downstairs sing "going to Jesus" downstairs, Abigail tells him that he put knowledge into her heart and showed her the pretense of these Christian men and women. Hearing the chant, Betty sits up and screams. Abigail calls for Rev. Parris, who believes that Betty cannot bear to hear the Lord's name. Giles Corey, an eighty-three year old man enters with Rebecca Nurse. Rebecca is the wife of Francis Nurse, a highly respected man in Salem and large landowner. Thomas Putnam holds a grudge against the Nurses, for they blocked the appointment of his brother-in-law as minister. Rebecca, who has eleven children and twenty-six grandchildren, claims that Betty's illness is nothing serious. She suggests not to look for loose spirits and rather to blame ourselves. Putnam suspects Proctor, because he has not been at Sabbath recently, but Proctor claims that there is no need to go, for Rev. Parris never mentions God anymore. Parris warns that there must be obedience or the church will burn like Hell, but Proctor asks if he can speak one minute without mentioning Hell. Reverend John Hale of Beverly arrives, a man who prides himself on the ability to ascertain witchcraft.

Miller interrupts the play for another historical interlude. Miller gives a history of the Church employing accusations of Satanic alliances against enemies, such as Luther and links this to his contemporary ideologies. In Communist countries, all resistance is deigned capitalist conspiracy, while in America during the time that Miller wrote The Crucible any person who was not a reactionary was considered a Red. There were witches in Salem just as there were Communists in America, but certainly nothing equivalent to the accusations.

Reverend Hale brings with him half a dozen heavy books. He introduces himself to Rebecca Nurse, who has heard of her great charity. Giles Corey tells Hale that Proctor does not believe in witches, but Proctor says he did not speak one way or another. When the men speak of the signs of witchcraft, Hale says that they cannot look to superstition, for the Devil is precise. Parris admits to the dancing and the conjuring, while Mrs. Putnam claims that witchcraft must be the cause of death for her seven children. Giles Corey asks Hale what the reading of strange books signifies. He says that he often awakes to find Martha reading in a corner and cannot say his prayers. Old Giles is the comical hero in Salem, who cares not for public opinion. Hale asks Abigail what happened in the forest. Parris claims he saw a kettle, but Abigail says it contained only soup, although a frog may have jumped in it. Parris asks whether they drank anything in it, and Hale asks Abigail if she has sold her soul to Lucifer. Finally Abigail blames Tituba, claiming that Tituba made her and Betty drink chicken blood. Abigail says that Tituba sends her spirit on her in church and makes her laugh at prayer. Putnam declares that Tituba must be hanged. Hale confronts Tituba. He says that if she loves these children she must let God's light shine on her. Hale asks if the Devil comes to her with anybody else. Tituba admits that the devil has come to her, and that the devil promises to return her to Barbados and shows how he has white people working for her, including Goody Good and Goody Osburn. Betty claims that she saw George Jacobs with the Devil, while Abigail claims she saw several others with the devil.

Analysis: 

 

First performed in January of 1953, The Crucible is first and foremost an allegorical tale relating the Salem witchcraft trials to their contemporary equivalent in Miller's time, the  hearings. The figurative Œwitch hunt' of McCarthyism becomes literal in Miller's play, which is constructed to illustrate how fear and hysteria mixed with an atmosphere of persecution may lead to tragically unjust consequences. Miller presents the play with traditional theatrical devices, relying on the dialogue and situations to illustrate his themes, but finds these somewhat insufficient; in the first act the play therefore contains a number of historical digressions that reveal the motivations of each character and which cannot be accurately conveyed through a strict stage interpretation.

Through these prose passages that interrupt the dialogue and action of the play, Miller establishes the particular quality of Salem society that makes it particularly receptive to the repression and panic of the witch trials. The Puritan life in Salem is rigid and somber, allowing little room for persons to break from the monotony and strict work ethic that dominated the close-knit society. Furthermore, the Puritan religious ethic informed all aspects of society, promoting safeguards against immorality at any cost to personal privacy or justice. The Puritans of Massachusetts were a religious faction who, after years of suffering persecution themselves, developed a willful sense of community to guard against infiltration from outside sources. It is this paradox that Miller finds to be a major theme of The Crucible: in order to keep the community together, members of that community believe that they must in some sense tear it apart. Miller relates the intense paranoia over the integrity of the Puritan community to their belief that they are in some sense a chosen people who will forge a new destiny for the world. This relates strongly to the political climate of the early 1950s in which Miller wrote The Crucible. After the end of the second world war, the United States found itself engaged in a struggle for political supremacy with communist forces, in particular the Soviet Union; just as the Salem authorities believe that witchcraft threatens their community, many Americans during this time saw communism as a threat to the American way of life.

However, the Salem witch trials as described by Miller have a sexual element that runs concurrent with the political aspects of the allegory. The community is one that promotes interference in all personal matters and intensely frowns upon any sinful conduct without allowing for any legitimate expurgation of sin. The witch trials serve as a means to break from this stifling atmosphere and publicly confess one's sins through accusation. This simultaneous fear of and fascination with sexuality is a theme that predominates throughout The Crucible, as demonstrated by the particular relationship between Abigail Williams and John Proctor and the sexual undertones of the dancing that instigates the witchcraft trials, and it also relates to the quality of 1950s culture in which the play was written.

The first act establishes the primary characters of the play who instigate the Salem witch trials. Each has his particular obsessions and motivations that drive him to push for the trials. The first and perhaps most reprehensible of these characters is the Reverend Samuel Parris, a man who symbolizes the particular quality of moral repression and paranoia that characterize the trials. Miller immediately establishes Parris as a man whose main concern is his reputation and status in the community and not the well-being of his daughter, for whom he shows little emotion. It is Tituba who shows more concern for Betty Parris than her father, who rules his household as an autocrat. When he discusses finding Abigail and Betty dancing in the woods, his concern is not the sin that they committed but rather the possibility that his enemies may use this sin against him. Parris will manifest a sharp paranoia concerning possible enemies, even when they may not exist. The particular quality of Parris that renders him dangerous is his strong belief in the presence of evil; even before the witchcraft paranoia, Proctor indicates that Parris showed an obsession with damnation and hell in order to strike fear into his parishioners. With the seeming presence of witchcraft in Salem, Parris now has a concrete, physical manifestation of the evil he so fears.

Abigail Williams is a less complex character whose motivations are simple; she is a clear villain with straightforward malicious motivation. Miller establishes that Abigail is suspected of adultery with John Proctor, a rumor that is confirmed later in the first act, while Abigail physically threatens the other girls if they disobey her. Abigail demonstrates a great ability for self-preservation: she admits what she must at appropriate times, and places the blame for her actions at the most convenient source, Tituba, when she realizes that it is the most savvy course of action. Abigail's lack of any morality renders her able to charge others with witchery no matter the consequences. The third character who serves as a proponent of the witchcraft hysteria is Thomas Putnam. While Putnam's motivation is suspicion and paranoia and Abigail's is mere villainy, Thomas Putnam demonstrates that his motivation is his longstanding grudges against others; the witchcraft trials give Putnam an opportunity to exact revenge against others, and, as will later be shown, to profit economically from others' executions.

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The final character who sets the witchcraft trials in motion is Reverend John Hale. Hale is perhaps the most complex character in The Crucible, a man who approaches religious matters with the conviction of a scientist and a scientific emphasis on proper procedure. Hale holds the contradictory belief that they cannot rely on superstition to solve the girls' problems but that they may find a supernatural explanation for the events. Since he lacks the malicious motivations and obsessions that plague the other instigators of the trials, Reverend Hale has the ability to change his position, yet at this point he ...

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