Crucible
Arthur Miller’s play The Crucible, takes place in the year of 1692 in the village of Salem, Massachusetts during the Salem witch trials. The play first opens with Reverend Parris discovering Abigail Williams, Betty, his slave Tituba and several other girls dancing in the forest in the middle of the night. The girls are thought to be engaging in witchcraft. At the time, villagers were not greatly educated, thus resulting in villager’s beliefs of witchery and interactions with the devil. Hysteria serves as a major theme in The Crucible. Hysteria is to blame for the killing of babies, the cause of the death sentence of 19 innocent citizens, and citizens being accused for collaborating with the devil. The Crucible significantly represents how hysteria can tear a community apart.
The deaths of several babies sets an example of how hysteria is incorporated in the play. First, Mrs. Putnam had seven babies and experienced each individual baby’s death on the day of their birth. Mrs. Putnam told Ruth Putnam to speak with Tituba to contact the spirits of her dead children in order to discover the murderer. Second, Mrs. Putnam blames the unfortunate deaths of her children on witchery. Third, Mr. Putnam gets revenge on Rebecca Nurse for murders of his babies. Mrs. Putnam’s hysteria over the death of her seven babies is shown when she says, “Let God blame, not you, not you, Rebecca! I’ll not have you judging me any more! To Hale: Is it a natural work to lost seven children before they live a day?”1 Not only does the Putnam’s reaction to the deaths of their babies set an example of how hysteria is incorporated in the play, but the death sentence of 19 innocent citizens also sets an example of how hysteria is incorporated in the play.
The deaths of 19 innocent citizens also provides an example of how hysteria is integrated in the play. First, the following quote provides evidence on how Abigail claims to have seen citizens with the devil, “I saw...
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