John Proctor as a Tragic Hero

1336 Words6 Pages
John Proctor The Hero, The Villain, The Man: John Proctor as a tragic hero in Arthur Miller’s The Crucible In The Crucible John Proctor is a tragic hero because his flaw prevents him from saving his community and instead causes his death. John Proctor has 2 choices in this novel, he can save his life and tarnish his name, or he can die with a good name. He is a tragic hero because he tries to help the community by tarnishing his name because he admits to committing adultery with Abigail Williams. His tragic flaw in this play is that he won’t sacrifice his name for the good of the community. This is a problem because if he wants to save everyone he has to sign his name to a piece of paper saying that he is a witch but he cannot do that because he is to proud of his name to tarnish it with such a thing, and in return he dies and cannot save the community. John proctor is a tragic hero in the novel The Crucible because he won’t let himself ruin his name. Edward Murray says “John Proctor is a physically powerful, distrustful of authority, and strong willed. Struggling against his own fears and guilt, reshaped by a new understanding of self at the end of the play.” In this quote Edward is saying that John is a strong willed person that struggles against his own fears. Meaning that he wants to save the community by admitting to everyone that Abigail is just trying to get back at Elizabeth, but his own fears of what the people will then think of him is holding him back from being the savior of the community. I chose this quote because I felt that Edward was saying exactly what I was trying to prove in my paper. He is saying that John is struggling to do the right thing because of his own fears and guilt about committing adultery with Abigail.( Siebold,64-67) In the novel The Crucible by Arthur Miller John Proctors tragic flaw is all that is stopping him from

More about John Proctor as a Tragic Hero

Open Document