American Crucibles the Crucible Contemporary World American

American Crucibles

The Crucible

Contemporary World

American Crucibles

The playwright, Arthur Miller, was born on October 17, 1915 (Hinman et al., 1994). While studying journalism at the University of Michigan he began to write plays and win awards. With a strong interest in the plight of common man, it was inevitable that Miller, writing plays with a current of leftist ideology flowing through them, would capture the attention of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). Subpoenaed to appear before HUAC, Miller refused to name names. Fortunately for Miller and American literature, the theatre scene in New York City was relatively immune to efforts to persecute leftists.

As a result of witnessing what was happening to American society under HUAC, Miller writes the now classic play The Crucible. This play is a fictitious account of the events surrounding the witch trials that took place in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692. Rather than write a play that merely depicts the events that took place, Miller used it as a vehicle to depict the moral dilemmas everyday Americans were being forced to make as a result of the 'Red Scare.' In the play, persons of integrity are faced with being hanged if they fail to confess to consorting with the devil. From Miller's perspective, those who refuse to confess to witchery are victims of long-held grudges by opportunistic adolescents. Escape from this dilemma is impossible for anyone with integrity, because confessing would be to lie and not confessing would be to die. This dilemma gives the play its name.

The main characters of the play run the spectrum of morality, from the mean-spirited and anxious Reverend Parris to the saintly Nurse Rebecca. An important engine of destruction is the Putnam's and their burden of grief after seven still births. Anne Putnam in particular seems particularly motivated to find some other reason for her inability to birth a healthy child and grasps at the chance to blame it her midwife being a witch, even if it means outright lying. Her husband, Thomas Putnam, seems to support her in this endeavor. The mischievous girls, Betty Parris, Abigail Williams, Sarah Putnam, and Mary Warren, try to cover up the fact that they voluntarily engaged in dancing in order to avoid a severe beating. To make matters worse, the girls also begged the Caribbean servant Tituba to conjure the spirits of Sarah Putnam's siblings. Both dancing and conjuring of spirits were forbidden activities in colonial Salem.

Abigail Williams, though, has a separate agenda when she begins to sense the power of the witch hysteria the girls have unleashed. John Proctor, a flawed, but morally sound husband of Elizabeth Proctor is the focus of Abigail's adolescent crush. Proctor's servant, Mary Warren, at first enjoys the ruse, but soon succumbs to John Proctor's entreaties to speak truth to power. Reverend Hale, the unwitting arbiter of the girl's attempts to avoid severe punishment is at first wholly convinced that the devil has captured Salem in his grip, but his convictions begin to waver during the course of the hearings.

The play opens in the midst of Betty Parris and Sarah Putnam acting as though they are bewitched. Reverend Parris is hand-wringing over the damage done to his reputation and thus his position in Salem. At first he seems convinced Betty is faking it, but after being confronted by Anne Putnam's claim that someone saw Betty flying, he seems to regard the idea of her daughter having come under the spell of a witch the better explanation. The choices made by Rev. Parris and Anne Putnam seemed to encourage the girls and they began to cast suspicion on anyone they may have an ill will towards.

Abigail Williams wants John Proctor for herself and therefore casts suspicions on his wife. John Proctor, however, has decided that he wants nothing to do with Abigail and convinces his servant, Mary Warren, to confess that the girls' behavior is nothing but a ruse. At a hearing the next day, Mary Warren does as requested, but Abigail intervenes by escalating the ruse and indirectly accuses Mary of being a witch. Out of fear for her life, Mary admits to consorting with the devil and John Proctor's attempt to right the wrongs is undone. Unwilling to have his confession displayed publicly, John Proctor chooses death.

Arthur Miller's play, The Crucible, may have been based on early colonial events, but it was intended to frame the communist witch hunts by HUAC in the same light (Hinman et al., 1994). As happened in Salem of 1692, so-called witnesses took the stand before HUAC and named the names of communists, socialists, and communist sympathizers. Years later, it was discovered that many of the witnesses for the state had in fact lied and were coached by HUAC and the FBI. As had happened in Salem, peoples' lives were destroyed by the legal weight irresponsibly given to the so-called testimony.

Miller describes the events taking place during the late 40s and early 50s as unimaginable, just as they were in Salem in 1692 (Hinman et al., 1994). During his research for the material that would enable him to write The Crucible, Miller came across court transcripts that captured an event belying the sheer ridiculousness of the situation. Two of the governor's sons traveled to the Salem Courthouse to watch the proceedings and during testimony actually began to laugh out loud; however, they were the only ones who were laughing and threats of jail and hanging soon curbed their incredulity. The seriousness with which the Salem officials took the accusations of witchcraft reminded Miller of the seriousness with which HUAC and the FBI took the communist threat. From the perspective of outsiders looking in, which is a perspective that Miller seemed to have been able to maintain, the events that were taking place were ludicrous, but the antagonists were deadly serious. As Miller states, "To lose oneself day after day in that record of human delusion was to know a fear, not for one's safety, but of the spectacle of intelligent people giving themselves over to a rapture of murderous credulity" (p. 15).

Miller argues that both witch hunts framed the accused as conspirators (Hinman et al., 1994). In 1692 Salem, the accused were alleged to be conspiring with the devil. In postwar America, communists and socialists were alleged to be conspiring with Soviet Russia. Miller points out that the same pattern has emerged during major revolutions throughout history, including in Revolutionary France and a Spain immersed in the Inquisition, where all opponents were named conspirators.