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Examples Of Reputation In The Crucible

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Prevalence of Reputation in The Crucible
In the words of famous business owner Warren Buffett, “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently.” The Crucible, by Arthur Miller, is a play that portrays the Salem Witch Trials as an allegory for the Red Scare. During The Crucible, Betty and others accused part of the population in Salem, Massachusetts of witchcraft. This causes many characters to act out of line and no longer use discernment in their actions. Throughout the play, Miller illustrates different themes as a motive as to why different characters may be acting the way they are. One of the main themes Miller portrays in his writing is how these characters act …show more content…

After Parris finds his daughter and others participating in a strange dance in the woods his daughter, Betty, mysteriously falls ill. Succeeding this, Parris is with his niece, Abby, telling her, “if you trafficked with spirits in the forest I must know it now, for surely my enemies will, and they will ruin me with it” (Miller 10). Parris proceeds to show no sorrow for his daughter and only cares about what the town will think of him. This event gives insight into how Parris is more worried about losing his job and ruining his reputation, of being a strong and morally right leader, rather than losing his daughter. Eventually, though Parris is voted out of office succumbing to his …show more content…

After the madness of witchcraft is spread around the town, false accusations are thrown out in a court setting. Elizabeth encourages John to travel to the court and denounce what Abigail is spreading around the town. He knows what she is doing is to preserve her reputation. However, he has no witness to back up everything she said, due to them being alone. This strikes Elizabeth as uneasy, due to John and Abigail having an affair, and she begins to question John's loyalty. John outraged, screams at Elizabeth to not “judge me more, Elizabeth. I have good reason to think before I charge fraud on Abigail, and I will think on it” (Miller 57). John knows that if he goes to the court that Abigail will ruin his reputation and tell everyone how he disobeyed one of the commandments and committed adultery. John ends up refusing to tell the court as he can not bear the thought of being seen differently. When Elizabeth is accused of witchcraft, John finally decides to ruin his reputation, as it is worth saving his wife. However, John is too late, as Elizabeth and his stories do not match. John has to live with the consequences of his actions, ultimately getting hanged. John does this all for the reason that he was too fearful to let his reputation be put at

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499 Words | 2 Pages

When his wife, Elizabeth, was being questioned by the court for being accused of witchcraft, John reveals his affair with Abigail, the one who accused Elizabeth, “She thinks to dance with me on my wife's grave!” (Act 3) This quote shows Abigail's jealousy and lust, which puts her as a disgrace to the court. This effects John because his reputation becomes destroyed, but he does it to protect his wife because it's the right thing to

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883 Words | 4 Pages

This time, John doesn’t sit back and allow Abigail to mess with his life and family. Instead, he gathers other husbands and provides evidence of Abigails foul play. As if that wasn’t enough, he confesses his adultery to the courts in the name of saving Elizabeth. However, instead of this helping, Elizabeth is scared because she’s pregnant and John is sent to jail for his “crimes.” Many times, the poeple try to tell him to say that he didn’t mean it, that he’d lied in the name of saving his wife, but nothing they said would get him to lie.

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877 Words | 4 Pages

Elizabeth is brought out to the court, in order to hear the truth. Danforth asks her why they dismissed Abigail from their home, she responds by saying that Abigail didn’t satisfy them. She is asked one more time, but ends up defending her husband. John is found lying, however he responds by saying that she just wanted to protect his reputation. Reverend Hale again defends the innocent by trying to blame Abigail for lying and causing trouble.

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671 Words | 3 Pages

Abigail has run away with her taking all Parris’s money. Hale has lost faith in the court, pleads the accused to confess falsely to save their lives, they refuse. Danforth asks Elizabeth to talk John into admitting about being a witch, she agrees. John, troubled by the thought, eventually agrees to confessing. When the court says his admission to witchcraft must be done publicly, Proctor grows angry and retracts his early admission to witchcraft.

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870 Words | 4 Pages

When John and Elizabeth are arguing over how John was in Salem and how he should tell the court what Abigail told him, John snaps at Elizabeth. He says “I say I will think on it!”. He is a little aggressive and very cold towards her when he says this. This shows the reader that he does not respect her because if he did, he would not be so rude to her. Next, John is saying how he was alone in a room with Abigail when she told him that there was really no witchcraft in the town.

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277 Words | 2 Pages

In Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables, it said, “Whether true or false, what is said about men often has as much influence on their lives, and particularly on their destinies, as what they do”. Reputation is an important part in many societies that determines the lives of many individuals. The Crucible, a play written by Arthur Miller, follows the town of Salem Massachusetts in 1692 during the Salem Witch Trials. It started when several young girls began to accuse people in the town of witchcraft, particularly people the girls don’t like. Then the accusations start to spiral out of control and the town government ends up hanging many innocent people.

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985 Words | 4 Pages

John felt like admitting to his affair, ultimately revealing Abigail's true intentions would finally prove to the court that Abigail was lying all along. He tells them that Abigail is making up lies about witchcraft all in order to get Elizabeth hanged because Abigail longs to be with John and believes that they are in love. Admitting to this is a big deal, not only because Abigail is a child, but also because their society is run by a christian government and adultery is considered very wrong. Abigail diverts from answering whether she denies the accusations or not, and John pleads for them to believe the truth. John claims that his own wife will tell them about the affair.

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1112 Words | 5 Pages

Based on the tragic events of the Salem Witch Trials of 1692, The Crucible is a hard-hitting tale that reflects upon the subjectivity of goodness and virtue, sparking the reflection of the importance of moral behavior during times of hardship and crisis. In an unyielding and restricted Puritan community like Salem village, a bad reputation could result in social exclusion and scorning from the community. As a result, many members of the community would go to extremes to avoid tarnishing their reputations. The Crucible asserts that those who are concerned only with protecting their standings are dangerous to a society, as they are willing to blame and hurt other people in order to protect themselves.

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586 Words | 3 Pages

But John just said before Elizabeth came in that he did commit adultery and Elizabeth knows about it too and that the court should bring her in to test her to see if shes guilty because Elizabeth never lies. But she did lie and say he was a good man. That is when Abigail screams and says she sees a bird thats trying to attack her she says that it is Mary, when obviously it wasn’t it was just all an illusion to overthrow the court once again. That is where Mary steps in after a while and joins and overthrows that act to get her out from being killed. All the other girls join in and repeat everything Mary says because if they don’t Abigail will turn against them and accuse them of witchcraft.

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915 Words | 4 Pages

In addition to the movie, John and Abigail weren’t really working this whole witchcraft drama. Abigail started saying very rude compliments about Elizabeth Proctor. Abigail shouted to John, saying, “with a bitter anger: “Oh, I marvel how such a strong man may let such a sickly wife be….She is blackening my name in the village! She is telling lies about me!

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850 Words | 4 Pages

The whole situation started when Abigail tried using witchcraft to kill her lover John Proctor’s wife, Elizabeth. Once the accusations begin, Abigail uses this to her advantage and accuses both Elizabeth and the Proctor’s servant of using witchcraft to harm her. Elizabeth realizes the motivations behind her accusations stating, “She’d dare not call out such a farmer’s wife but there be monstrous profit in it. She thinks to take my place, John.” (Act 2).

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857 Words | 4 Pages

His own worries are expressed when Parris exclaims, “But if you trafficked with the spirits in the forest I must know it now, for surely my enemies will and they will ruin me with it”(Miller 1131). He knows that if people were to find out, he could lose everything he worked for. Therefore, Parris does everything in his power to at least prove someone guilty, and in the process, completely goes against the morals he teaches. He is seen as a Godly man who is supposed to teach integrity. However, instead he becomes a man that cares less about the truth and more of preserving his own

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675 Words | 3 Pages

In his tragic play, The Crucible, Arthur Miller tells a story of the Salem Witch Trails in a historical yet fictitious context. The plot of the play highlights the nuances of the struggles that individuals faced during the 17th century. The struggles included in the play help Miller develop themes of reputation and deceit. I feel like these themes are relevant to today’s times because people of power still yearn for a good reputation and are willing to deceive for it. For this reason, I wish to recreate this play onto the stage but with a modern twist.

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838 Words | 4 Pages

She accuses Elizabeth Proctor of witchcraft, hoping to eliminate her romantic rival and protect her own reputation as a respectful young woman. In act I, line 203, Abigail explains to John “She is blackening my name in the village! She is telling lies about me! She is a cold, sniveling woman, and you bend to her (p.578). Abigail explains to John that Elizabeth is a bad woman, but all Abigail is doing is ruining her reputation when lying about her name in the village.

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453 Words | 2 Pages

Elizabeth cannot be hanged because she is pregnant and the child inside her is innocent. John finds Abigail and tells her to stop all this nonsense and to never mention Elizabeth’s name in court again. Abigail is then found with a needle into her and blames it on Elizabeth. Soon enough John gets accused of witchcraft and has to confess to it or he will hang. While he’s in jail, Abigail asks him to run away with her to Boston so that they could be together and so that he wouldn’t get hung; John refuses.

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