The Crucible

This book is about the witchcraft events in Salem. The story takes places in a small town called Puritan village. In the beginningof the book Betty, Daughter of Samuel Parris, gets sick. Betty, his father and his niece Abigail live together. Abigail saw his parents murdered by Indians and he is an orphan. One day Betty,Tituba, Abigail and some other girls from town dance in the woods and Parris sees them, she becomes ill after this. There are too much rumors about Betty's illness. People say that her illness is due to the witchcraft.

Harris asks his niece about what was going on in the forest and he says he admits that they were dancing but it has nothing to do with witchcraft like people say. They also speak about the rumors for example: one of the girls was naked when they were dancing, someone was screaming, and a formal employer Elizabeth Proctor thinks that Abigail is immoral. Abigail denies this. One day Thomas and Ann Putnam arrives to the town and they tell Parris that their daughter Ruth is ill to ask for help. They say they sent her to Tituba (slave of Parris) because they heard that he is able to speak to the dead so that she can find out who murdered her seven children. Nurse Rebecca visits Betty and tells her thatit is nothing serious other than a childish phase. People blames Abigail about this, then all the sudden Abigail blames Tituba saying that Tituba made her and Betty drink blood and that Tituba sends her spirit out. Putnam thinks that Tituba must be hanged.

One day John Proctor comes home a bit late at night because he was planting in the fields. Elizabeth Proctor suspects that he had been in town. A court official, Mary Warren, was also there to discuss about Tituba and Abigail. Elizabeth tells John that she will tell the cops that Abigail admitted that Betty's sickness has nothing to do with witches. John tells her that nobody is going to believe him because he was alone. Mary Warren tells Proctors that the courd have decided that  39 people will be arrested and Sarah Osburn will be hang but not Sarah Good because she has confessed. John Hale visits Proctors to let them know about the court. He says that Elizabeth's name was mentioned in the court and Rebecca Nurse was charged of this. he makes Proctor state the ten commandments to be sure that he is not lying. He remembers 9 of them, Elizabeth reminds him the last one. Proctor tells Hale what Abigail admitted about Parris in the woods. Hale thinks it makes no sense. Hale asks Proctor whether he believes in witchcraft or not. He says he does believe but not the fake ones like in Salem.

Ezekiel Cheever arrives to arrest Elizabeth on the charge that she sent her spirit out for Abigail and put a needle in her. Cheever finds the doll, which has a needle on it, but Mary Warren says that she made the doll on the day of the court , even though Abigail saw her making it.John Proctor goes to the court with Mary Warren and shows a deposition signed by Mary that asserts that she had never seen any spirits. Parris knows that they are there to overthrow the court, but still Danforth questions if Proctor has any ulterior motive and tells Proctor that his wife is pregnant and which means that she will live at least one more year, even if convicted. When Putnam goes to the court Giles Corey blames him being the murderer. They have long discussions in the court. Marshal Herrick arrives drunk to the jail and wakes Sarah Good and Tituba up. They speak about the witchcraft events. Parris arrives and tells Danforth how Abigail vanished with Mercy Lewis and stole his money. Danforth calls Elizabeth Proctor and Hale tells her that he

does not want Proctor to die because he would feel responsible for the murder. Elizabeth thinks that this may be the Devil's argument. Hale begs Elizabeth for Proctor to sign a confess but Elizabeth says that Proctor now has his goodness, and nobody should take it away from him.

Review:

The book was pretty exciting especially at the beginning. I liked reading this book because it is very realistic. We see how people blame each other in front of the court. I had some confusions with the characters because there were over 20 characters in the book. In this book we realize how people in old days lived and how different the life was back then. I realized weaknesses each of the characters in the book. Each of them had weird characters, none of them cared whether the person is their best friend or best enemy they suspected each other to get rid of the court. In overall the book is fascinating because it is because of it's content. the speech is, as it was in that time.it tells a tale of a little girl who gets caught being "naughty" and blames it on the circumstances of those she doesn't like or has problems with.

I think the main thing that this book teaches that to lie about something that is very small might make it much bigger  and much more complicated to deal with. We reliaze that how narrow minded and uneducated the Puritans were.

I think although Abigail and the girls initiate the tragedy, responsibility lies with the whole Salem community. I believe that Abigail and the other girls started the tragedy what with all their talk about spirits during the first act. For one reason it can be said that the blame lies with the whole Salem community. In my opinion, if people get hurt and the whole community falls apart then it is a tragedy. I think this book is a tragedic book Many different emotions and different characters are in the play and each one holds part of the blame about the witches it causes people to turn against each other and all the principles that these people  once believed in.

Abigail and the other girls deny everything. Part of their denial is blaming. By shifting the blame on someone else, they think that they will not be responsable for their own sins so these girls are the main ones that messed up everything in Salem. Everybody in Salem wants the whole tragedy to end almost everyone in the community had a way of making the tragedy continue on longer than it needed to be because they likes gossiping and watch people punished. Bu still Salem witchcraft trials will never be forgotten, fortunately now the facts are understood and people in Salem lived happily uptodate.