Historical Accuracy Of The Crucible

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). One night is the town of Salem Massachusetts, a group of girls go dancing in a forest with Tituba, a black slave. The local minister, Reverend Parris, catches the girls dancing and one of the girls, Parris’s daughter falls into a coma. The commotion causes a crowd to gather and fills the town with rumors of witchcraft. Reverend Hale, an ‘expert’ on witchcraft, question the leader of the girls, Abigail Williams about what had happened in the forest that night. She admits to doing nothing more than dancing and from that night on we follow the town through the stories of the Salem witch trials we are all familiar with. Miller said that his play is historically accurate but there are still parts that over the years,

Miller was born in Harlem, New York on October 17, 1915. Born into an immigrant family with Polish and Jewish descent, he grew closer to his mom, Augusta, who was an educator and an enthusiast and advocate of reading. The Miller family was wealthy but lost a majority of their saving due to the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and had to move out of Manhattan. After High School, Miller worked odd jobs to support his family and to attend the University of Michigan. While he was there he won the school’s Avery Hopwood Award for his first play, No Villain. Inspired by his professor Kenneth Rowe, Miller moved and began his career as a