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The Crucible Greed

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Although the novel, The Crucible took place a long time ago, the ideas and aspects of the play connect strongly to our current lives. A common theme that relates to modern America is greed. Abigail Williams, who takes part in the majority of the play definitely is the instigator of issues. All of the town 's problems somehow connect back to her. The strongest connections to me are the use of rumors, peer pressure, and wanting to gain power. One of the main characters named Abigail Williams causes most of the rumors in the play. She is the leader of the younger girls who start the trouble in the town. The way she acts is very similar to the way a highschool girl may behave, but on a more extreme level. One of the first things she does in the …show more content…

The last strong connection is the power struggle in the play compared to current day. Again Abigail is the center of the problem with her obsession of being with John Proctor. Her small lies begin to get bigger as she realized what kind of power she gains. She tries to manipulate John by reminding him about their affair from before. Her goal is to replace Elizabeth and be with John instead. This kind of manipulation and struggle has been going on ever since and continues heavily in current day. Everyone at one point in their life has said something false to benefit themselves. This same issue happens between Thomas Putnam and Reverend Parris. Thomas is a wealthy man who owns land in Salem and only wants to gain more. He wanted the land of the church but Parris got to it first so now he holds a grudge against him. When a group of people are in the court Giles Corey states, “If Jacobs hangs for a witch he forfeit up his property-that’s law! And there is none but Putnam with the coin to buy so great a piece. This man is killing his neighbors for their land.” (The Crucible, page …show more content…

After connecting the three points to evidence in the play and to real life it’s easy to see the similarities. Rumors are the start to all problems in the play and the start to most problems involving social status. In present day rumors are spread like wildfire throughout schools. The problem is people believe anything they hear, doesn’t need to be from a reliable source. The next big problem in the play was peer pressure. Like mentioned earlier some of the characters felt the need to join in on things just because everyone else was. The strict rules of the time period made lying easier than telling the truth, same as today with overstressed kids. The last issue talked about was power gain. A big motivation for the characters was them trying to get something that wasn’t theirs. Overall, the point of connecting all these problems from puritan time to modern time was to show it’s a bigger issue. If these social issues are still happening hundreds years later that might mean it’s time for a

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