In The Crucible written by Arthur Miller, one of the characters who goes by the name of Abigail Williams is the orphaned niece of Reverend Parris, she was once the mistress of John Proctor but Elizabeth Proctor discovered the affair. Abigail is extremely jealous of Elizabeth she ends up using her power that she has in the town to get rid of her and anyone else that discredit her in the past. She will not let go of John Proctor and she is the leader of the girls, she tells lies manipulates the entire town and her friends. This sends nineteen guiltless people to their get hanged in front of the whole town while Abigail is still free of the harm and lies she told.
If witchcraft were a problem in my town I wouldn’t do anything sketchy. I wouldn’t lie about my friends. I wouldn’t even push my friends to lie for me. Abigail should be executed due to the fact that she’s the main reason so many innocent people were executed. She started it all, she has lied and she has also had an affair.
During the Salem Witch Trials a lot of people were accused of using witchcraft. As a result
In a small village called Salem, witchcraft and sorcery exist, however everyone is pointing fingers but not a single soul knows who is actually to blame for this nonsense. During this time period of hysteria, there are multiple scenes that are very questionable due to one person and one person only. Abigail is the one most responsible for the hysteria and witchcraft in Salem. She threatens the group of girls that accompanied her in the woods while they all danced. She has also lied about many things on multiple occasions in which causes an extreme amount of suspicion.
In the play Abigail only cares about herself and what she can do to protect herself. When the girls talk in Betty’s room and Mary shows weakness and wants to tell everyone about what they did in the forest, Abigail gets really angry. She threatens the girls and is not afraid to show what she is willing to do. “Now look you. All of you. We danced. And Tituba conjured Ruth Putnam’s dead sisters. And that is all. And mark this – let either of you breathe a word, or the edge of a word about the other things, and I will come to you in the black of some terrible night and I will bring a pointy reckoning that will shudder you. And you know I can do it; I saw Indians smash my dear parents’ head on the pillow next to mine, and I have seen some reddish work done at night, and I can make you wish you had never seen the sun go down!” (Miller 12). This quote shows how Abigail has changed and what she’d do if she was confronted with such a situation. She made the decision quickly and opted to only save herself. Over the course of the book it gets represented pretty well that she is capable of doing everything to hold up her reputation: she wants to be a saint. Every decision she makes is like a little test that shows what kind of person and friend she is. Coming off of this she doesn’t perform well as an example as either of
In The Crucible by Arthur Miller, the setting is Salem, Massachusetts during the late 1600s where the town’s pious Puritan beliefs directly influence their government. A 17-year-old girl named Abigail Williams had an affair with John Proctor, a wealthy, married man. Abigail is told by John to move on but instead, Abigail starts accusing the townspeople of witchcraft, including John Proctor’s wife Elizabeth. As this hysteria begins to rise, other people such as Thomas Putnam, a rich landowner, start to also allege Salem villagers. In this play, the author illustrates the central idea that people should not allow jealousy to control their actions.
Abigail seems like an innocent girl to everybody however it is later found out that she is one of the people who puts herself before others and makes things worse to get herself out of trouble. In act one Reverend Hale was questioning Tituba, a slave from Barbados. Tituba was explaining what the dancing and the disturbance in the woods and Abigail says she “wasn’t conjuring spirits”(Miller ??) but in reality she was caught attempting to cast a spell on Elizabeth. The reason for her trying to cast a spell is because Abigail falls in love with John Proctor but he is married to Elizabeth but that doesn’t bother Abigail.
In Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible, Miller demonstrated that it was Abigail William’s flaws: lust, vengeance, and jealously that led her to be responsible the most for the tragedy of the witch hunts in Salem. Abigail Williams started the entire suspicion of there being active member of witchcraft throughout Salem, Massachusetts. She did this for her own benefits and used trickery to get what she wanted. Abigail was corrupt and only cared for her own desires. There are many reasons that these flaws are crucial to the outcome of the play. These flaws will be her downfall.
Abigail is the villain in this play. She’s the woman who holds grudges, is selfish, and a great liar. Abigail seems to be especially gifted at spreading destruction and chaos wherever she goes. She is able to manipulate others, for example, all her friends and the whole town. In addition, she obtains control over all of them and sends nineteen uninvolved people to their deaths. All these things add up. Abigail 's heartless attitude is shown in act two when she frames and accuses Elizabeth Proctor for witchcraft. She desired and longed for this revenge on poor Proctors innocent wife, aiming for her through out the play. Later on in Act Three she seems to lose her last attachment of society by destroying John Proctor, who she claims to love with all her heart. When John attempts and threatens to expose Abigail’s wrong doings, she skillfully manages to turn the whole problem around on him, sending him off
Abigail Williams was the goody two shoes that kept her reputation high, until she turned on many with a single lie. In The Crucible By Arthur Miller, is set in the year of 1692 in Salem, Massachusetts where a witch outbreak has jailed many of the women from a fault of one girl named Abigail. It causes havoc in Salem that will lead to death in the village. Abigail has shown many transformations and showed that she is very dynamic from her emotions, to her actions, and to her experiences throughout the story of The Crucible.
The Crucible by Arthur Miller is a play which contains a multitude of complex characters . In the play, the characters’ motivations and inner processes are explored. Because of the historical setting, the characters live in a society of judgement and extreme religious devotion. This is a factor that places any of the characters’ choices and morals in a public balance to be judged by others. Abigail Williams is the main character of the play and acts with an utter selfishness and obsession.
Sam Robert in the article, A Decade of Fear, argues that Americans turned against each other because of McCarthyism. Robert supports his claim by explaining, contrasting, and demonstrating the effects that McCarthyism had on humanity. The author’s purpose is to persuade in order to convince the reader that McCarthyism sparked betrayal and fear among Americans. The author writes in a tone for his educated audience. I strongly agree with Robert’s claim. McCarthyism resulted in Americans turning against each other because of politicians greed for power, paranoia, and the fear of communist infiltration.
In the play The Crucible, Arthur Miller tells the story of the Salem witch trials taking place in
As time has passed, throughout history, during different periods of time there are parallels. There are three eras that we are focussed on, where there are three types of people during each era. The three different eras that we’re focusing on, are The Salem Witch Trials (1600s), The McCarthy Era (1950s), and Today (2000s); the three types of people are the people who are the reasons why there’s accusations towards the accused, the accused, and finally the accusers.
Abigail is the character mainly to blame for the outrage in Salem. She is a liar, double faced hypocrite that will stop at nothing to get herself out of the mess that she created. Making her one of the main killers of these innocent puritan people. At the beginning of Act 1 Abigail confesses to dancing in the forest seen in the quote: “Abigail: We did dance, uncle, and when you leaped out of the bush so suddenly, Better was frightened and then she fainted. And there’s the whole of it. Miller 10.” In this Puritan society something as simple as dancing is considered abnormal. Furthermore, since this takes place in the woods it raises more suspicion, this is