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John Proctor As A Tragic Hero In The Crucible By Arthur Miller

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Arthur Miller wrote the Crucible in 1953 several years into the Cold War. Arthur Miller book the Crucible is a not so well hidden allegory for McCarthyism. McCarthyism is named after Senator Joseph McCarthy and his witch hunt for communists, during the Cold War. This was done in order for McCarthy to gain political power similarly to what Reverend Parris and the girls did during the Salem Witch Trials. The time of McCarthyism is now called The Red Scare. John Proctor does not qualify as a tragic hero. While he possesses many character traits of a tragic hero, he lack one important factor. He admits to lechery. Therefore giving up his pride. His pride is his tragic flaw, however it does not cause his downfall like a tragic hero's tragic flaw should. Instead the giving up of his pride is what leads to his downfall and ultimately his death. …show more content…

Now if he was prideful enough to have it tragic flaw he would not admit it was a mistake like in this quote from Proctor “Abby I may think of you softly from time to time. But I will cut off my hand before I’ll reach for you again wipe it out of mind. We never touched, Abby”(22) This quote from John Proctor were we admits that he was wrong. Crealy shows that he is willing to give up his pride as he continues to do in the later Acts leading to his downfall. During Act 2 we learn more about John Proctor’s home life and what we learn is that while the Proctor family are not poor, They currently aren't as well off as the traditional Tragic Hero as evidenced by this Quote from Proctor “If the crop is good I’ll buy George Jacob’s Heifer.”(48) Therefore John Proctor has less to lose than most tragic heros making the main thing he ends up losing being his respect among the people of

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