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Examples Of Paranoia In The Crucible

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The Crucible was published in the year 1953, during the height of the Cold War. The United States this was the Mccarthy era, which was the period when many feared the spread of Communism in our country. Senator Joseph Mccarthy initiated this whole movement that led to McCarthyism and the House Un-American Activities Committee, which sought to put a halt to all Communist activity in the United States. In addition, The Crucible by Arthur Miller is an incredible play that gives feedback on Salem Witch Trials in Massachusetts not only that, but it parallels the McCarthy “witch hunts” that took place in the mid 1900’s. The play is an allegory, which means that the story holds a much more deeper meaning than what we perceive. It is considered to be based of McCarthyism because both occurrences thrived off paranoia, involved unjust accusations, and ruined lives. …show more content…

For example “All that changed, however, in the postwar atmosphere of fear and contempt for the Soviet Union, at which time HUAC's activities commanded broad popular support and consistently attracted major headlines.” (House Un-American Committee), in the quote it shows how even with the lack of proper evidence the paranoia of citizens increased the popularity of the situation on Communism. In addition during that time period, fear commenced the lack of trust between communities, and citizens. As Arthur Miller himself states that, “My basic need was to respond to a phenomenon which, with only small exaggeration, one could say paralyzed a whole generation and in a short time dried up the habits of trust and toleration in public discourse” (The Crucible, The Salem Witch Trials, and McCarthyism), it shows how The Crucible had the purpose to emphasize the paranoia on these

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The times back then were terrible. The Crucible is a play written by Arthur Miller in 1953 about The Salem Witch Trials of 1692.McCarthyism was the “witch hunt” for the communist in 1953.the parallels between The Crucible and McCarthyism are naming names,lack of proof ,and reststance. The first reason they are parallel is because of naming names. Hollywood director Elia Kazan went in front of the HUAC twice. The first time he did not confess and names.

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577 Words | 3 Pages

Arthur Miller wrote The Crucible in 1953. Arthur Miller wrote the play because he was inspired by McCarthyism. McCarthyism was the hunt for communists that was taken too far. In The Crucible he presented a universal message. He was comparing how communists did exist and witches did not, but yet they were both taken as serious.

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807 Words | 4 Pages

Throughout history the fear of corruption and change has compelled people to go to drastic measures to prevent it. The Crucible, a play by arthur Miller, is set in an environment of religious citizens who fear that the devil and witchcraft will corrupt their society. Much like The Crucible, McCarthyism caused the citizens in America to fear corruption of the government by communism. Arthur Miller used his play the crucible as a direct response to McCarthyism and through this play Miller writes about the Salem witch trials during the McCarthy period to comment on how history repeats itself. The social and political factors in The Crucible resemble those in America during the red scare and McCarthyism.

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McCarthyism period took place over the years The Crucible has been written and significantly impacted Arthur Miller’s thoughts while writing the book. The Crucible was seen as a modern-day witch hunt story in the McCarthy period. McCarthyism means the practice of publicizing accusations of political disloyalty or subversions without any evidence. Joseph R McCarthy made false accusations while being senator and charged people for being communism. Both McCarthyism and The Crucible by Arthur Miller are connected because paranoia is evident and innocent people are accused.

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As a historical comparison, the characters o the Crucible lived under religious law where only the ways of Christianity were accepted as decided by those that rule the community. In the same way, the 1950’s and the Cold War led many Americans to have an anti-Communist stance and nationalism was encouraged (Fitzgerald 32). In the Crucible, the initial accusation was created when a group of girls were accused of dancing in the the forest, a place considered by Miller as an evil place (Miller 8) in the wake of the mysterious illness of the reverends daughter (Miller 9). During the McCarthy era, the suspicion was started by McCarthy himself as he accused a number of state department officials from being Communist and Soviet spies (Fitzgerald 45-46). In both examples, the initial accusation were groundless as no evidence were presented.

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696 Words | 3 Pages

Arthur Miller wrote The Crucible in 1953, as a response to McCarthyism, which is, in general, accusing people of crimes with little to no proof. It ran rampant through the United States during the Second Red Scare through the early 1950s (exactly when Arthur Miller wrote The Crucible). In The Crucible, Miller juxtaposes the leaders, who rationally think for themselves, and the followers, who believe what everybody else believes, through irony, imagery, and denotation. The Crucible is riddled with irony, and Arthur Miller utilizes situational and dramatic irony to show the difference between followers and leaders.

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773 Words | 4 Pages

The Crucible is a 1953 play written by Arthur Miller. It is amplified and somewhat novelized story of the Salem witch trials. Miller wrote the play as a parable to the McCarthyism persecution of communist sympathisers. In this play, a group of Puritan girls are found dancing and conjuring with the devil in the forest. Soon the whole village of Salem knows about the dancing and starts accusing people of witchcraft.

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McCarthyism was a vociferous campaign against alleged communists in the US government. Many of the accused were blacklisted or lost their jobs, although most did not in fact belong to the Communist Party. In these two events, many similarities

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Behavior and choices are often affected by the society we live in, these are commonly reflected through literary works. The Crucible by Arthur Miller is a play that follows the lives of the characters who play citizens of the Massachusetts Bay Colony during the time of the Salem Witch Trials. This play is set in 1692, and written close to 300 years later, in 1952. To someone with no knowledge of the political climate in the 1950s, writing The Crucible during that time may seem arbitrary.

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The Crucible a play by Arthur Miller was created in 1953. The Crucible was based on a Salem Witch trail which occurred between 1692 to 1693. Miller wrote the play as an allegory. The witch trail that’s took places in Salem shows how a community can be torn apart by lies, fear, and religion.

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In 1953 Arthur Miller wrote the play, The Crucible. Arthur Miller wrote the play to display to the American people the inner workings of politics during the communist hysteria. Similar to U.S. politics, the people of Salem were accused of being witches, just as people were accused of being communists. The hysteria of witchcraft lead to many accusations and the death of 19 innocent people. The accusations made were motivated by personal desires of the accusers.

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Miller asserts that the Communist trials pertain to a hysteria that was an unforeseen delusion and a source of controversy through the use of a competent tone, parallelism and repetition reflecting paranoia, and lastly an abstract diction. The Communist trials of the 1950’s are best represented by the allegory of The Crucible at its finest, and yet the people did not catch on to its ideas, the sense that Miller emphasizes an illusion is susceptible to reality in his argument is a very simple conclusion. The extent to which the Communist trials traveled and to the point where it stopped is still at large unbelievable, but at least that time in history is gone … or is

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719 Words | 3 Pages

Arthur Miller constructs his play upon the famous Salem witch trails. Miller's Crucible was written in the early 1950s. Miller wrote his drama during the brief reign of the American senator Joseph McCarthy whose bitter criticized anti- communism sparkled the need for the United States to be a dramatic anti- communist society during the early tense years of the cold war. By orders from McCarthy himself, committees of the Congress commenced highly controversial investigations against communists in the U.S similar to the alleged Salem witches situation. Convict communists were ordered to confess their crime and name others to avoid the retribution.

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534 Words | 3 Pages

The Crucible is an American play written in 1953 by Arthur Miller. The famous play is a partially fictionalized adaption of the true events occurring during the Salem witch trials in 1692. The Crucible was first performed with E. G. Marshall, Beatrice Straight and Madeleine Sherwood in a Broadway production at the Martin Beck Theatre. The opening act, is a background on the Salem village and the colonists of Massachusetts. The narrator tells us of, “an isolated theocratic society in constant conflict with Native Americans” (1).

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707 Words | 3 Pages

Hysteria in Salem The Crucible is a play written by American author, Arthur Miller, in 1953. It is a somewhat fictional play about the Salem Witch Trials. Miller wrote it as an allegory to the Red Scare, the promotion of fear of a potential rise of communism. Miller himself was blacklisted for refusing to testify in front of the HUAC, a committee that was created to investigate any person who might be a communist.

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