The Crucible Abigail Williams Speech Analysis

In The Crucible by Arthur Miller, Abigail Williams, an unmarried orphan in the Massachusetts town of Salem, increasingly grows more jealousy of Elizabeth Proctor intensifies in attempt to realize her desire for Elizabeth's husband John Proctor. Her ambition for vengeance only grows stronger, and her selfishness escalates. She repeatedly lies to save herself by denying her involvement in witchcraft. In order to save herself she accuses the innocent, without any sense of ethical violation. Abigail proves to be a selfish antagonist in The Crucible that shows no sense of right and wrong.

Have you ever blamed your younger sibling for something you did just so you would not get in trouble? That is what Abigail Williams did in The Crucible, yet she blamed the townspeople of Salem, Massachusetts resulting in a massive witchcraft hysteria. The witchcraft hysteria was a tremendous outbreak of multiple irrelevant trials causing 20 people to get hung. All these deaths and trials were all caused by one girl, Abigail Williams. I think Abigail Williams is responsible for the witchcraft hysteria because she lied about getting stabbed with a needle and she blamed everybody else for being a witch but herself.

Abigail believed that Proctor actually loved her and she waited every night for him. She was brainwashed to think he would leave his wife for her. The witchcraft accusation came from the beginning of the story when Abigail and the girls were dancing naked in the woods and chanting. She made false accusations that people in the village were worshipping the devil to cover what she had done. Many lives were taken but Abigail had no empathy for anyone who was hanged. Proctor realized the truth behind everything and decided it was time to come forward and tell Danforth, “She thinks to dance with me on my wife's grave! And well she might, for I thought of her softly. God help me, I lusted, and there is a promise in such sweat. But it is a whore's vengeance, and you must see it now” (Miller ). John tries to reveal who Abigail really is but it does not help the lives of those who are to be hanged. Abigail uses her own personal desires to get to what she wants even though many people died in the

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.

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 spring of 1692, the Salem witch trials began after a group of young girls claimed to be possessed by the Devil and accused several local women of witchcraft. The tragic death of many people was caused by just a few young girls just as it was in the play. In The Crucible by Arthur Miller, the main character responsible for the tragedy in Salem was Abigail Williams. Abigail was the reason for the start of many of the things that happened, such as: being caught in the woods, leading to the idea of witchcraft; pretending to get stabbed by Elizabeth’s spirit, leading to respected people being accused; and threatening people with her authority, leading to the death of many people.

Abigail Williams was the main cause of Salem witch trials because Abigail was the first person to start accusing innocent people of witchcraft. Due to young Abigail actions, 20 innocent people took the calling of death for her actions. how many People do you know willing to lie and cheat the rules to get anything they want .? The fact that twenty people died all because of Abigail craving attention and wanting her own personal gain from accusing others of having spoken with the devil or witchery is insane. I blame Abigail for anything that has happened during the witch trials of Salem.

“Controlled hysteria is what’s required. To exist constantly in a state of controlled hysteria. It’s agony. But everyone has agony. The difference is that I try to take my agony home and teach it to sing” (Arthur Miller, AZ Quotes). In the play, the Crucible, by Arthur Miller, Salem, Massachusetts was a place of constant hysteria in the 1600s because of what would come to be commonly known as the Salem Witch Trials. This was a full-blown witch hunt for people found to display signs of witchcraft. Abigail Williams was the main person to blame for this pursuit of witches in Salem because, first off, she was the one who caused hysteria about witchcraft just to cover up the fact that

The Salem Witch Trials began in Salem Massachusetts in 1629. Many people were accused of being a witch and many lives were lost.

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 Williams, seventeen... a strikingly beautiful girl, an orphan, with an endless capacity for dissembling.” (9) Dissembling. To conceal one's true motives, feelings, or beliefs. Ms. Williams keeps up her act of hindering the town’s social and political life with the use of false rumors and excessive lying. Ms. Abigail does not make a good impression on the reader as they find her immediately start lying. She, according to her religion and her towns customs, has broken the law. Abigail told the judge at court, after her uncle accused her of dancing in the woods as they danced naked, that none of the sort happened, but then changed her answer stating that “it were sport” (11) and it did not matter what they were doing. Then she had to take it a step further by adding that Tituba was associated with witchcraft. Abigail was the reason of the death of nineteen people, not to mention all of the people she had sent to prison. Abigail was in fact much of

Abigail Williams is not your typical teenage girl. She is a girl that will drink blood to kill someone, accuse people of witchcraft, and have a affair. By looking at The Crucible, one can see that Abigail Williams develops the theme of reputation, which is important because people who fear losing their reputation spread hysteria.

Abigail Williams told many, many lies in The Crucible. The reason the witch trials began in the first place was because of the lie she told about being in the woods. She didn’t want to tell the truth about what happened in the woods to the adults because she wanted to protect herself. She manipulated the young girls to lie and say they were only dancing, “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”(Miller).

In My mind the whole Witch hunt has been a popularity contest People are trying to rack up kills like a Call Of Duty session are the Hunger Games. “ Abigail Williams, fingered 41 different witches for attacking her’’( Schanzer 56). I believe she was trying to get more people to like her and comfort her since she had been “attacked”. Maybe she just wanted to get back at someone which leads to one thing revenge.

In The Crucible, many of the characters were slightly altered from the original Salem Witch Trials to make the story more interesting. Abigail Williams was one of those characters. She has several changes, some major, some minor, but they affect the story in a big way. While there are many differences, there are also some historically accurate things about her thrown in as well. Abigail Williams from The Crucible has several similarities and differences from the Abigail Williams from the Salem Witch Trials.