The Crucible Abigail's Madness Analysis

976 Words4 Pages
The Madness that is Abigail Williams: Her Intentions in The Crucible “How hard it is when pretense falls! But it falls, it falls!” With these chilling and ominous words, Abigail’s twisted sense of revenge rings hollow in Arthur Miller’s terrifying play, The Crucible. A masterpiece of its time, The Crucible brings forth the true horrors man is capable of: deception and vengefulness. No character presents these values as well as Abigail, whose lust and heartbreak for John Proctor results in a homicidal goose chase. Because of her hate towards Proctor’s wife, Elizabeth, Abigail creates demented tales, directed at abolishing the “problem.” Though Abigail’s wild canards seem quite obtuse in civilization today, at the time her acts fell to justification. Furthermore, because of Abigail’s childlike disposition in wiggling her way out of punishment as well as her lust and love for John Proctor, she found deceiving the people of Salem easy, seeing as the threat of witchcraft and demons loomed dangerously in the hearts and minds of all who lived there. Though the…show more content…
Miller portrays the start of her vengeful needs through an intimate love and hate scene between the two characters, resulting in Proctor disowning their previous relationship: “Abby, I [Proctor] may think of you softly from time to time, but I will cut off my own hand before I’ll ever reach for you again… we never touched, Abby.” Proctor rejects any attempted reconnections with Abigail, implying he is committed to his wife, Elizabeth. This honesty from Proctor, whom she revered and adored, pains her in ways she cannot comprehend, leaving her cold and merciless as she attempts to shield herself from the unbearable scars Proctor left her. Miller’s use of “cut of my own hand” reveals Proctor’s emotions during the scene: exhaustive and slightly guilty. However, he feels frightened by Abigail intense pressure to make him hers, and
Open Document