In this play there are characters that are, in the puritanical belief, good and bad; no in between. The characters that cause such destruction and the death of many that are considered “good” are Abigail and Danforth. The one that seems brave and a good man is John Proctor. Abigail in the play accuses people for being witches because she danced in the woods with some of the girls. She decides to blame others so it doesn’t show on her.
She had people fooled to believe that she had god in her and she could see the evil in people and could tell if they were in witchcraft. One person after another she had them hung. People so clueless of her intentions saw her as a saint for getting rid of the “evil” in the town. In the end of the play Abigail’s reputation was soon found out about, she knew people would come back and accuse her of murder so she ran away with her uncle’s money and Mercy Lewis. In contrast with Abigail Williams Elizabeth Proctor was not your ideal woman.
Parris caught the girls dancing in the forest. He suspected them of doing witchcraft. He was worried that his reputation would be ruined. 2. Why do the Putnams come to the Parris house?
In this quote Abigail in The Crucible (published in 1952), tells Parris that they were accusing the girls of witchcraft because they were dancing in the woods. There was not proof that what the girls were doing was affiliated with witchcraft. “I saw Goody Hawkins with the devil” (51) the girls start naming off people to keep themselves out of trouble. This definitely could tie back to the McCarthy case because they were giving unjustified evidence. McCarthy was listing names of Communists but he had no proof behind it.
Act I mostly describes the main characters in the play. The act takes place in Reverend Parris' home. Reverend Parris discovered his daughter dancing naked in the woods with other girls and his negro slave, later he called in the Reverend Hale to investigate his doubts and thinking’s of the witchcraft. In this act what really talks about is the superstition of Parris, also it could be said that it talked about the viciousness of Abigail, and what I thought was the most important one, was the secret of Proctor with Abigail. During Act II it shows that Proctor wants to defend himself from the truth.
Pinkie’s Roman Catholic and Ida’s paganistic beliefs represent two extremes in ‘Brighton Rock’; how does Graham Greene explore the relationship between these character’s actions and how they are formed and affected by their personal religious code. In Brighton Rock, Pinkie is portrayed as the villain despite his Roman Catholic beliefs. Pinkie neither smokes nor drinks and believes in hell however he has no morals when it comes to the subject of murder and other crimes, which should be strongly against his religion. The description of the two also differs greatly, with Ida’s curves and Pinkie’s sharp edges Greene created much dissimilarity in their appearances and their personalities. Throughout the novel Ida and Pinkie’s beliefs influence their actions and create a contrast between the characters even though they do not directly speak.
The Crucible Essay The Crucible, the famous play written by the playwright, Arthur Miller, written during the Red Scarce in 1952, shows the mass hysteria for witchcraft in Salem, Massachusetts. Reverend Parris catches his daughter, Becky, and his niece, Abigail, dancing in the woods. Abigail admits that they were dancing, but tells him and Hale that the Devil already has other people’s souls, which leads to harsh accusations and fallacious executions. Both, Arthur Miller’s life and The Crucible have two connections: One, in that both, had paranoia about a certain subject. In the United States, there were worries of Communism infiltrating the government; however, in the Salem community, there were worries of witchcraft being practiced in the town.
Reverend Parris At first the authority figures in Salem believe the accusations of witchcraft He is the local clergyman of Salem and the father of Betty, who is unconscious at the beginning of the play. He has discovered the girls dancing in the forest with Tituba. From the beginning of the play he is paranoid about having enemies. He is the most dislikable character in the play. Although an adult and a clergyman, he seems to be more worried about his own reputation than about the well-being of the children and of the townspeople.
This forces Goodman Brown to rethink the Devil’s tales of his forefathers. This is one case of an "unknown" brought to light by the Devil, which damages Goodman Brown’s sense of what is true because it contradicts a past thought. The "truth" of his ancestors brought by the Devil only slightly effects Goodman's faith overall because the ancestors never showed signs of evil during their lifetimes towards him. Yet this one discovery of "truth" is truly significant towards the fall of Goodman's sanity, for it leads him to believe he may have other incorrect understandings of life. This is exactly what the Devil wanted to happen because now that he has broken a truth that Goodman Brown previously had, he suddenly gains faith in the devil.
People may choose to respond to conflict in a self-serving way in order, to save their reputation or solely because of the fear that they will loose everything that they have ever worked for. In the play ‘The Crucible’, Reverend Harris is given the choice of whether to tell the truth about the girls dancing in the forest or to maintain his position. His ‘ name is solid in the village’ and will not have it ‘blackened’ by some girls dancing in the forest. He claims he has ‘many enemies’ and ‘for surely they will run him with it’. Despite knowing the girls have danced in the forest, he chooses not to tell the truth in court to save his position and not have his 3 year earned hard work thrown away due to the ‘stiffed-necked people’, further showing that an individual is given the choice in conflict and may act in a irrational and negative way just for their own agenda.