Summary Of The Crucible Act 1

In the second act of Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, John Proctor and his wife Elizabeth address the issues between them for the first time. This friction between them was the result of John’s affair with Abigail Williams. Even from the beginning of Act 1 we could see that there was a serious resentment between Abigail and Elizabeth Proctor which caused Elizabeth Proctor to kick Abigail out off her services. When Elizabeth sees that John is still trying to protect Abigail from harm, the suspicions she kept inside becomes apparent to the audience and the confrontation that follows becomes the foundation of their argument. Miller utilizes both literary and structural elements to put emphasis on the conflict between these two important characters.

Although John Proctor still feels guilty because of his unfaithfulness to their marriage, he cannot take Elizabeth’s doubtfulness anymore and defends himself. However Elizabeth is yet to put his betrayal behind her and move on as we can see when John tells Elizabeth “You forget nothing and you forgive nothing”. Also from the repetitious usage of the word “confess” we can see that John is an honest man as he told the truth to Elizabeth himself rather than her finding out about the affair and accusing him of treachery. Furthermore we can understand that John feels as he is getting questioned in a courtroom rather than feeling he is in a safe family environment from the terms and motifs Miller uses throughout the passage such as “confess, judge, justice, charge, fraud… Furthermore John actually admits his feelings and tells Elizabeth that he is fed up with feeling of being in a