...Character Analysis of Abigail Williams Author Miller’s drama The Crucible takes place in the seventeenth-century in Salem, Massachusetts. Salem suffers from witch-hunts, trials, and false accusations. In effect, the town is full of worry and suspicion; and when young girls falsely accuse self-righteous neighbors in Salem of witchcraft, the town goes against itself, which ultimately causes a conflict between power and aggression. The personality of Abigail Williams, the understood leader of all the young girls, ultimately causes the whole play to go into effect. Abigail displays that she is sinful, envious, and manipulative. Abigail Williams’ characteristic of sinfulness causes her to be the antagonist of the whole play. Abigail commits...
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...Adolf Hitler’s Nazi regime, during the World War II era. During that time Hitler’s ideology and lack of social responsibility towards the citizens led to the death of millions of people. The citizens of Germany were incapable of taking responsibility and standing up for the millions of people that suffered and died. The society of WWII Germany is similar to that of Salem’s in The Crucible written by Arthur Miller because one of the larger issues in the community is the lack of social responsibility from the citizens and judicial system causing the hysteria and deaths in the Salem witch trials of 1692....
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...Tragedy and The Human Conditions Essay: Abusive Power “Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power. ” In a statement by Abraham Lincoln it is identified that the greatness of man is tested by how he utilizes his power. As demonstrated in William Shakespeare's Macbeth, Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, and The Time Magazine article Adolf Hitler, one can see how the abuse of power creates chaos in society. By analyzing the actions of the characters Macbeth, Abigail Williams, and the character Adolf Hitler, it is evident how the misuse of power will lead to the loss of structure in society. “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” A statement by Lord Acton which illustrates that those who gain power ultimately become corrupted by it - thus leading one to abuse their power. This statement is well demonstrated in the actions of the character Macbeth, from William Shakespeare’s play Macbeth, in his rise to power from Thane of Glamis to the King of Scotland. Within the first scene of the play, Macbeth is given the gift of knowledge of the future, by the three witches, which he ultimately uses to gain more power. “All hail, Macbeth! hail to thee, Thane of Glamis ... All hail, Macbeth, thou shalt be king hereafter!” (I.iii. 48-50). When given this prophecy from the three witches, Macbeth utilizes this information, once he becomes Thane of Cawdor, to plan the death of King Duncan. The power of knowledge is...
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...Lindsey Sibille Ms. Gonzales AP English III, 1 16 October 2015 The Crucible Book Card Assignment Authorial Background Arthur Miller is the award-winning playwright of The Crucible along with many other famous plays such as Death Of a Salesman and All My Sons. Born in Manhattan in 1915, Miller experienced the pressing and devastating times of the Great Depression and both World Wars. His first two plays were The Man Who Had All the Luck and All My Sons, with the latter being performed on Broadway in 1949. His next play, Death of A Salesman, received a Tony award, the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award, and the Pulitzer prize. These awards allowed him to rise to fame and helped his career skyrocket. Despite his successful playwriting...
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...The Grudge Trials In Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, Miller shows the reader that rivalries and grudges can drive people to do crazy things. In The Crucible, the puritan community of 1600s Salem received a chance to reap revenge on people they had problems and disputes with by accusing others of witchcraft, which would either leave the accused dead or their name ruined. Everyone from Thomas Putnam, a land owner greedy for land, to Abigail Williams, a teenager involved in adultery, accused others due to personal rivalries and grudges. Abigail Williams is most known for accusing Elizabeth Proctor, a religious woman and wife of the man with whom Abigail had the affair. When Elizabeth hears of the incident, she immediately fires Abigail, which leads Abigail to believe that Elizabeth is cold and callous. Abigail’s jealousy of Elizabeth leads her to accuse Elizabeth of witchcraft and she has Mary Warren, a servant to the Proctors, place a poppet, or small doll, made to be Abigail with a needle in her side, into the Proctor’s home. With this happening, Elizabeth believes that Abigail “thinks to take my place” (II.384) as John’s wife by ensuring she is hung. It is Abigail’s personal rivalry with Elizabeth over John’s attention that sets the stage for others to seek vengeance in court. Thomas Putnam is a wealthy land owner in Salem greedy for as much land as he can buy. Putnam and his family accuse Francis Nurse, an amicable man, due to a desire for Nurse’s land. Putnam...
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...The Crucible by Arthur Miller is a play where the town of Salem conducts witch trials and exhibits extreme behavior resulting from dark desires. One notable character, Abigail Williams, was the cause of the mishaps within Salem and displayed an erratic behavior to the townspeople. Her distinct personality and persona have stood out within the plot and ruined John Proctor’s reputation. Abigail Williams actions and dialogue portray her, not only as manipulative but bossy and selfish. Abigail’s physical description ties into her manipulative nature. For instance, she is described as “a strikingly beautiful girl, an orphan, with an endless capacity for dissembling” (Miller 8) This suggests that she is powerful in regards to her lies and is tactical...
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...You may be asking yourself what does fear mean?? There a lot of manys for FEAR. The word fear mean something that can get you in trouble or you in dangerous, likely to cause pain, or a threat. Inside of you can feel that something bad will happen because of that fear you have inside of you. In the Crucible there are a lot of examples of fear that have been shown. To began, In the crucible there a lot of fear. From all the lies people start saying and then they end up believing the lies they have told. Like John Proctor one of the character from the crucible show fear. Proctor have been in a secret romance with Abigail Williams and he is scared that people with find out. If people start to find out then his reputation will get ruined, and...
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...Condemned Do you know the story of the crucible, if so do remember abigail williams. I just wanted to tell you do you think that abigail is guilty for the lies she made. She has committed in the town of salem. Is Abigail to blame for everything is she responsible? Abigail in the crucible is a very chaotic girl. She is a girl that hates everyone she wants everyone to do what she wants to do. She is a girl who will do something bad and she will get in trouble and she won’t get in trouble. Abigail is a horrible girl she made up a lie to get out of trouble and it cause many of innocent people to die for it. How much is Abigail to blame for the events that took place? She is all to blame for all of the horrifying events that happened in the town of Salem. She did...
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...One basis for stating that this film is unreliable is found actions characters portrayed. One case in the film can be found in the opening scene when the accusers along with Tituba dance around a boiling pot while a chicken is decapitated; in reality, there is no evidence nor recollection of this ever occurring. Also, the film states that this particular event was the cause for the entire witch trials but this is erroneous. Actually, the reason for the start of the trials was unknown until Linnda R. Caporael ,a professor of science and technology, proposed in 1976 that the reason of the accuser's hallucinations were caused by rye infected with fungus. An example of missed character portrayal in the film was seen in the character of Abigail...
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...Fear can lead good people to do horrific acts, especially when religion is involved. For example, in the play The Crucible the girls who was following Abigail knew dancing was considered in Salem as an act of the devil. When they got caught dancing in the forest, they began to think about their punishments in this case, were whippens, jail, or even worse death. They decided to keep following Abigail's lead and began to claim that the devil and these images of the people from Salem tried to make them do horrible things. Soon Abigail started to take advantage of this power and used it for evil. Millers play The Crucible shows us how vengeance and land can determine weather some one lives or dies. It also shows how many accusations can lead...
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...punishments escalate from being whipped to being hanged in a matter of hours. Betty Parris and Abigail Williams’ crimes went from being discovered in the forest doing unnatural things, to accusing people of witchcraft. The punishment of accusing people of such accusations results in be hanged. The lying done by these two girls creates a madness among the town. By the end of Act 1 of The Crucible, Betty Parris and Abigail Williams’ secrecy make the people in the town of Salem break out in witchcraft hysteria. The Crucible opens with Betty Parris lying still on her bed while her father, Reverend Parris, is kneeling beside the bed in agony. When Betty, along with other girls from the town, are discovered by the Reverend dancing in the woods, she suddenly falls ill. Her illness rapidly escalates from natural causes to unnatural. When Abigail comes in to inform Reverend Parris that Doctor Giggs cannot discover what is wrong with Betty, he says, “Let him look to medicine and put out all thought of unnatural causes here. There be none” (Miller 9). This allows the reader...
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...Crucible Essay Suspicion can destroy because it causes hysteria and there are consequences for that. Rod Sterling’s quote and The Crucible are very similar in the way that suspicion ruined many lives and reputations in each story. The Cold War was a war of words, a war of suspicion, of hatred and power. Arthur Miller and Rod Serling both connect to the war in the 1950s in an allegorical way. In the play, The Crucible, Arthur Miller expresses similar views about suspicion through the characterization of his characters. Abigail Williams represents the idea that words can destroy and cause suspicion. “I never called him! Tituba, Tituba! (42)” Abigail is denying calling the Devil with the girls in the woods and accusing Tituba of doing so. Abigail accusing Tituba makes the other girls start to...
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...In Arthur Miller’s The Crucible (1953), Abigail Williams is depicted as a metaphorical witch as she lies her way through the literal witch hunt taking place in Salem, Massachusetts. The witch hunt was brought about by Abigail and her shenanigans with her friends as they do things that the Puritans believed were evidence of witchcraft. We learn later in the story that among Abigail’s mistakes is the fact that she was involved in John Proctor’s affair. So when the court begins investigating witchcraft within Salem, Abigail has to save herself. She begins telling lie after lie and finds herself in so deep that she sees an opportunity to have John all to herself by getting his wife executed, which she tries, but doesn’t succeed. As the play comes...
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...vengeance has played an important role in history and literature. In the play The Crucible by Arthur Miller the theme vengeance is portrayed as neighbor turns on neighbor. First, as the theme vengeance reoccurs throughout the play The Crucible many people end up turning on each other to exact their revenge. For example, Hale is in the home of the Proctors when he brings up how Rebecca Nurse’s and others names got brought up in court. Then Francis Nurse the husband of Rebecca Nurse enters the house following Giles Corey to inform them about his wife’s arrest, Francis exclaimed, “For the marvelous and supernatural murder of Good Putnam’s babies”(Miller 1175)....
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...Trials In the book The Crucible by Arthur Miller, the theme of hysteria is dominantly present throughout the entire play. It is not hard to narrow down the cause of the widespread hysteria to three people that inevitably had their hand in the trials. The devious character, Abigail, shows her wicked mind and skill of manipulation in the play so she can get what she wants, John Proctor. The slave, Tituba, gave into the accusations and started the hysteria of the witch trials. The last character that contributed to an entire town’s belief in witches would be Danforth. His stubborn and narrow minded attitude had people dangling from a rope. It is easy to say that Abigail Williams is the triumphant ringleader of the accusers in The Crucible. Constantly pointing fingers, she named name after name and everyone believed her whole heartedly. At the beginning of the play, Reverend Parris accused Abigail of witch craft but to avoid punishment she passed the blame to Tituba saying “I never called him! Tituba, Tituba…” (Miller 42). Abigail took no responsibility for her actions but blamed another person claiming, “She made me do it! She made Betty do it!” (Miller 43). Once Tituba confessed to witchcraft, Abigail joined in by accusing others of witchcraft so the negative attention would not be on the girls. Once Abigail started accusing people, Betty woke up from her “infinite” sleep and joined in along with the other girls. When the trials began, it was Abigail who kept the charade going...
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