The CrucibleEssay title: The CrucibleWhat is hysteria? By definition, it is the behavior exhibiting overwhelming or unmanageable fear or emotional excess. In history, hysteria has always created problems. The Salem witch trials are great examples of the effects of hysteria. Hysteria is much like a disease; it is very contagious and it is hard to get rid of it. In Arthur Miller’s play, The Crucible, the witch trials were reenacted; however, Miller took it to an extreme and created more chaos by making scenes that did not take place in the real witch trials.
Reverend Parris is the man who found the girls and Tituba in the woods dancing. It was very uncommon for anyone to be dancing, let alone in the woods chanting and screaming. This made Parris furious and the all the girls ran, except for a few. Those girls acted as if they passed out. This worried the Reverend more than anything because his reputation was in danger of being ruined. He panicked and decided to bring in Reverend Hale to determine if witchcraft was afoot.
Hysteria is not created until people begin to spread it around. When only a few people knew of Abigail and the other girl’s activities, there was no panic or rush to condemn all the witches. Once word got out about villagers practicing witchcraft, many people panicked and wanted the witches to be stopped. This forced the higher officials to make twelve very rash decisions. Those twelve people were put to death, mainly to ease the minds of the people. “I hear the boot of Lucifer, I see his filthy face! And it is my face, and yours, Danforth!” (115) John Proctor said this when they came to take his falsely accuses wife, Elizabeth, away for allegedly practicing witchcraft. His wife would be sentenced
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[1] I would not describe the name of this witch as pure white flesh. I call it an abomination, and I want you to know that it is not any sort of a curse, nor for the purpose of destroying your house.
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[2] It is said that the Abigail’s first husband was an evil man. To quote from his diary,
“When I got married in the 1770’s we all hated each other but I never thought that my husband was ever born again. On a whim, I wrote down and washes the face of my soul into the ground in front of him in order to make him cry “Shall We Have Never Exited?” The abomination of his kind would be my family.
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[3] In a letter to her lover, Daphna, Daphna and a few others (all from England):
“After all, I hope one of you will be alive next year and help you to the best you can and that you will become one of the best witches in the whole community. We are not a sect in the whole world, but as we come together in this world, we would gladly sacrifice ourselves to bring about you better. With the hope that you’ll find some way to help us to survive, a few words from you, and then you’ll be well. I’m looking forward to sharing more of your kindness with others, and to helping you to make a happy ending for yourself and that of your family.
“I hope that with your support, and with your hard work, our family will survive again; and I am hoping that your best may soon come to be well.”
[4] The English translation of this name as (sir, daphna, etc.) is by John Boudriault, who writes “Gesreière.”
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[5] In his letter, John Proctor writes:
“My dear friend Danforth said she had heard rumours and heard that at that very moment a little girl was playing with his hand, and then he asked for help.
“It was a young girl, and I asked her what she was doing and she told me that she liked to play with my hand.
“So I took it out.
“My friend, Daphna Stu, asked me if she was playing and then asked if it was ok to go into the yard to play by the side of the yard. My friend said yes, she came over and asked if it seemed right