The Crucible, by Arthur Miller, is a historical fiction play about the famed Salem witch trials. Historical fiction? So it’s both historical fact and fiction? Is it more fact or fiction? In my opinion this play, The Crucible, is more fiction than fact. This is only my opinion though, it is not a fact and it cannot be proven that the play is more fact than fiction or the other way around. In this paper I will discuss why it is my opinion that The Crucible is more fiction that fact. In my opinion that Arthur Miller changed too many things in the play to make it very factual. Why did he do that? I think that there are several reasons.
One of the reasons is in fact the reason he wrote the play. According to several sites Miller wrote the play to be a parody of the McCarthy era, in which there was a ‘witch hunt’ for communists. (Context) Miller was actually one of the people questioned by the McCarthy committee. We now know that the McCarthy witch hunt was based on very little real, factual evidence, much like the Salem witch trials. Not only was this play supposed to parody the McCarthy era, chances are Miller wrote the play to be a success.
Many good books have a love interest to make the book more readable. Arthur Miller wanted to do good work, just like everyone else who writes stories, and to make the play better he added a love interest between John Proctor and Abigail Williams. That is one of the huge changes that he made to the story. The love affair did not, and could not happen. In The Crucible, Abigail Williams is 17 years old and John Proctor is middle aged and probably in his 30’s. These ages that Miller gave them in the play were not correct, but they made the chances of them having an affair more feasible.
The Essay on Play Analysis of “The Crucible”
One of the most awful chapters in human history, timeless oppression. Parallels between The Crucible, and more modern examples of "witch hunting" such as the McCarthy hearings of the 1950's, are appalling. Other such time periods in history, including the 1940's Japanese American Internment era, the Apartheid struggle of South Africa, or Hitlers horrid Holocaust , all exemplify persecution and ...
According to one site, Miller later admitted to changing the age of Abigail from eleven years old to seventeen, but he never said anything about John Proctors real age being sixty-something. (Margo Burns) The real ages of Abigail and Proctor destroys the idea of their affair, which is one of the bases of this play. In the play, Abigail started the whole witch hunt because she wanted Proctor to be hers again. This is one of the largest detours from fact in The Crucible. Not only did he change the ages of some of the main characters, he also changed their occupations and families. For instance, John Proctor was not a farmer, but an innkeeper.
Another example of this was in the Putnam family. In the play, Goody Putnam wails that only one of her eight children (Ruth) lived beyond infancy. In actuality she had six living children at the time, and none of them were named Ruth. The daughter in the play had her name changed from Anne Putnam Junior, to Ruth Putnam, probably to keep people from getting confused.
There were many other differences between the historical fact, and Miller’s fiction. For one thing, there was never any dancing in the woods or conjuring with Tituba in real life. The only ‘magic’ that the girls actually did with Tituba, was trying to find out what jobs their future husbands would have, by looking into a ‘magic crystal ball’ made out of an egg in a glass. (Margo Burns) One last way he changed the facts in a major way was that he just plain left out many characters.
For example, in real life a man named George Burroughs was hanged. He was important because he was Salem’s former minister. (About the Crucible) This hanging was very controversial because, like Rebecca Nurse, he was very well respected and supposedly he prayed the Lord’s Prayer before he was hanged, which no witch was supposed to be able to do. (Margo Burns) To be honest though, there are many facts present in The Crucible. In actuality the play does generally follow the story of the Salem witch trials. In the play Elizabeth Proctor is saved from being executed by being pregnant.
The Essay on King Hamlet Ghost Fact Play
Hamlet's Ghost In the Shakespearean time period people believed in ghosts and reported them, so it makes sense that Shakespeare would write about a ghost appearing in the play. There is plenty of evidence in the play to prove that the ghost is real. In the first act the ghost appears to two soldiers Marcellus, and Barnardo, as well as to Hamlet's friend Horatio, who is a very credible and ...
This is another fact in the play because she was really saved from execution by being pregnant at the age of 41. It is also a fact that Giles Corey was weighted to death for refusing to enter a plea of guilty or not guilty. (Margo Burns) It is my opinion that Arthur Millers, The Crucible, is more fiction then fact. In this paper I have discussed why I think he changed the play from the facts so much, what he changed, and what he didn’t.
I enjoyed this play for what it was, historical fiction not a factual representation of the witch trials. Historical fact or historical fiction, this is a question you must ask about any piece of historical literature. Works Cited ” About The Crucible” Classic Note on The Crucible. web Margo.
“Arthur Miller’s The Crucible: Fact or Fiction.” 14 July 2000. web “Context” The Crucible Sparknotes. web.
