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John Proctor: A Tragic Hero

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In the play The Crucible by Arthur Miller, the town of Salem is afflicted with hysteria, intolerance, and accusations that lead to death. According to philosopher Aristotle, a tragic hero possesses a tragic flaw, excessive pride, and an inevitable downfall. Protagonist John Proctor illustrates a tragic hero because he is presented as happy, powerful, and privileged, which later leads him to suffer because of his own actions. First of all, John Proctor possesses a fatal flaw, pride, which is a characteristic of a tragic hero. Proctor’s fatal flaws includes honesty and pride. He lacks honesty because he wants to keep his image held high, which ultimately lead him to his death. He could have saved his own life by confessing to witchcraft, but …show more content…

John Proctor illustrates that he is an ethical man because he highlights the fact that young girls, children, are controlling Salem purely with their words. Proctor 's ethical attributes are conveyed when he realizes that the group of accusers may be pretending to be afflicted, “I’ll tell you what’s walking Salem – vengeance is walking Salem. We are what we always were in Salem, but now the little crazy children are jangling the keys of the kingdom, and common vengeance writes the law!” (73) which causes other to question his credibility. He also speaks this to emphasize the problem that everyone assumes that the accusers, children, are innocent. He also underlines that people have personal motives to accuse other because of their biases. Another example of this is in act III, when Proctor confesses to his act of adultery in order to save his wife from death, “God help me, I lusted and there is a promise in such sweat...My wife is innocent” (102). Proctor is attempting to accuse Abigail of faking all the accusations and affiliations with the devil because he knows that Abigail longs to remove Elizabeth from his life. His admission of adultery conveys his feelings of guilt and extreme love towards his wife Elizabeth. Proctor exudes ethics even when it damages his own

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The Tragic Hero of The Crucible A tragic hero is a character who undergoes a devastating fate for the greater good. They are often protagonists meant to arouse pity by relating to the reader. The Crucible by Arthur Miller features John Proctor as its tragic hero; he is a leader of Salem who dooms himself due to his fatal flaws and mistakes. John Proctor, though a mere farmer, wields considerable influence in Salem.

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With Proctor as The Crucible’s tragic hero, it is crucial that he possesses qualities in which the audience can admire, but also relate and identify with. With these attributes and flaws in mind, Proctor has a primary flaw, selfishness, that is the main contributor to his

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“A man cannot become a hero until he can see the root of his own downfall,”Aristotle. In Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, John Proctor, the main protagonist of the play faces several situations in which he struggles both internally and externally; all of the struggles that Proctor encounters throughout the story heavily affect those around him, but most importantly they impact the way that he perceives Salem and his own life. Truthfully, the troubles that Proctor experiences in life are the most impactful occurrences in The Crucible because they reflect the righteousness that is within him, even in times of corruption; it is ultimately Proctor’s ability to discover righteousness that allows him to be seen as an tragic hero. It can also be said

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As telling the truth is a noble quality, it is also a flaw. In a Theocracy, adultery was illegal and a sin, but he professed himself to save Elizabeth. "For I thought of her softly, god help me, I lusted... But, it is a whores vengeance and you must see it" (Miller 110). Although he unveiled himself in court, it only got him in a bigger predicament.

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Also, Proctor was well aware that Abigail had earned great power in the court system by falsely accusing people of witchcraft. For this reason, anyone else who had not been caught in the hysteria of witchcraft felt that they could not contradict Abigail’s lies. People feared that they would be accused of witchery if they were to oppose the accusations. John Proctor had to choose between preserving his reputation and allowing lies to continue to flourish Salem, or show his immoral actions to give to ending the fraudulence. Proctor had the best rebuttal to Abigail’s lies and, therefore, he felt that it was his duty to start the end to the madness.

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Previous to the witch hunt, Proctor had committed adultery by sleeping with Abigail Williams, and this evil act had caused him to live in fear of being discovered as an adulterator. However, after witnessing the constant disingenuous acts of Abigail throughout the entirety of the witch hunt, Proctor gave himself up for the prosperity of the community when he declares, “I have known her, sir. I have... known her” (Act III). Through Proctor’s confession to adultery in front of the court, readers can fully understand the compassion he possesses. This revelation is possible because, John was fully aware of the abominable charges he would have to face, but he was willing to be killed if it would mean the end of Abigail’s antics and thus the end of the death of innocent people.

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As the whispers grew louder in the town of Salem, the accusations grew as well. John Proctor was a man who stood up for what he believed in. Throughout the play we see fingers being pointed at each other trying to see who can be blamed for witchcraft.

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The one person who could have stopped the Salem Witch Trials was none other than a tragic hero. Aristotle developed the idea of a tragic hero in a story. This person was someone who was an exceptional person, they were quite prideful, and by the end they must die. In the play The Crucible by Arthur Miller, John Proctor is a tragic hero. He is an exceptional man with lust as a fatal error, he takes pride in his name, and by the end he dies and repents.

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Moreover, he would be justifying the existence of witches, which would further galvanize future spurious accusations. In addition, Proctor claimed, “I have three children - how may I teach them to walk like men in the world, and I sold my friends?” This quote insinuates that if he were to lie to his kids, they would not admire him as a role model and instead feel ashamed of him. Clearly, Proctor’s honor contributed to the ultimate decision of ripping up the signed

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John Proctor: Tragic Hero or not? By definition a Tragic Hero is a literary character who makes a judgment error or come in contact with a fatal flaw that inevitably leads to his or her own destruction. John Proctor, a farmer in the play The Crucible, is debated as a tragic hero. John Proctor suffers from a tragic flaw that leads to his demise, that fatal flaw is his excessive pride.

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Proctor is widely respected in the Salem community. However, he has a secret that threatens his reputation. He cheated on his wife Elizebeth Proctor with Abigail Williams. As a result, he has a strong internal conflict regarding his integrity. Proctor is a benevolent man at heart, however he has sinned according to puritan law.

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John Proctor, the protagonist of The Crucible, qualifies as a tragic hero because he has a tragic flaw, is ethically superior to the other characters in the play, and struggles to find peace with himself in midst of the lies and chaos during this play. John Proctor possesses a tragic flaw that forces him to hide his prideful mistake, which eventually brings about his downfall. I guess the old saying is true, “Pride comes before the fall”. John Proctor’s tragic flaw is his excessive pride, and he expresses it abundantly throughout the play. In Act I, it states, “ Proctor: Abby, I may think of you softly from time to time.

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Proctor’s guilt is present when he, attempts to pay for his sins by giving his wife materialistic objects, hesitates to obey his wife's suggestion to accuse Abigail of false bewitchment, and breaks out in anger for not wanting to be judged any longer. The romantic relationship between the Proctor’s is undoubtedly extinguished, but even casual engagement cannot exist without tension since everything John Proctor says to Elizabeth is a symbol of repentance. He offers Elizabeth the possession of a cow and expresses “with a grin” that all he

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The first impressive characteristic of John Proctor is his bravery. Speaking out against the “afflicted” girls in the way he did could cause serious question of him as a person. From the court’s standpoint John could be seen as directly opposing the court, which would have him jailed, or could even have him be accused of witchcraft. Also, he would have had to have known that Abigail Williams would have immediately accused him of being a witch once he spoke out against them. However, that did not stop him from delivering the truth to the court.

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He was given the choice to either confess to being apart of witchcraft and be spared or not confess and get hanged. He is allowed to talk this over with his wife and at first they decide it would be better to confess even though they know he didn’t do anything! At this point in the play John realizes that it is not the right thing to do. He says “ How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul now give me your name.”

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