Examples Of Peripeteia In The Crucible

Bob Riley once said, “Hard times don’t create heroes. It is during the hard times when the ‘hero’ within us is revealed,” (Brainy Quote). In The Crucible by Arthur Miller, John Proctor, a hard-working farmer living in the strict religious Salem, MA community, must endure many difficult obstacles when the town is seized by clinical hysteria to hunt down accused “witches”, revealing the true hero in himself. Arthur Miller experienced a similar situation during the hunt for communists known as the Red Scare and exposed his own heroism also. Although the term “hero” has been defined in various ways, from men with super-power capabilities to a fireman running into a burning building, Aristotle establishes strict conditions that construct a tragic

Peripeteia is one of Aristotle’s requirements that classifies a tragic hero and is found in classic pieces of literatures, specifically The Crucible, and also in the life of Arthur Miller. Peripeteia “is a reversal of circumstances, or turning point” and is a key component of Aristotle’s tragic hero (Wikipedia). John Proctor peripeteia’s not only justifies him as a tragic hero, but also enhances the play by identifying the point where John Proctor’s inevitable fate is sealed and his comeuppance begins. John Proctor’s reversal of fortune is when his wife, Elizabeth Proctor, is accused by his mistress, Abigail Williams, of being a “witch” and Elizabeth is arrested (Miller). At this point, John Proctor is doomed to become involved in the calamity of the witch trials to save his wife, and in the end is tried and hanged himself (Miller). Similar to John Proctor other tragic heroes experience peripeteia, such as Shakespeare’s Romeo in Romeo and Juliet and Homer’s Odysseus in The Odyssey. Romeo’s peripeteia occurs when he kills Tybalt, the cousin of his wife, this action precipitates Romeo’s banishment from Verona, the spark that ignites the chain reaction of events which eventually leads to the

Aristotle’s contingency that a tragic hero must unearth a realization is thoroughly met by John Proctor. He refuses to disgrace his own name with lies for the purpose of survival, and protested in saying, “How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul; leave me my name!” (Miller). Soon after he proclaims, “I do think I see some shred of goodness in John Proctor,” (Miller). John Proctor’s revelation demonstrates how he is enlightened in knowing how his name and dignity require greater preservation over his own life. Tragic heroes in other works maintain a self-knowledge resembling John Proctor’s, for example Romeo and Odysseus. When Romeo sees the his true love Juliet is “dead” he reflects on his actions and recognizes the truth in that his fate was his own doing (Shakespeare). Odysseus encounters his epiphany during his visit to the Underworld, Achilles describes how he would rather be a man lowly ranked in society than be dead (Homer). This awakens Odysseus to the fact that life is precious and fragile and should not be wasted, and appropriately infuses him with a new-found inspiration to return home as a result of this exploration (Homer). John Proctor’s adequacy as a tragic hero is substantiated in that he like other tragic heroes come to a understanding of some truth. Arthur Miller reaches an identical