Throughout the play, The Crucible, written by Arthur Miller, hysteria fueled by the fear of witchcraft spreads like wildfire through the damaged and subdued Puritan town of Salem, Massachusetts. The Crucible illustrates that it only takes one person to make an entire society become unhinged, especially violently. Abbigail Parris’ motivation for fueling the hysteria was the power and respect that she receives as a result of it, and she, as a character, demonstrates that in the right conditions, all it takes is a spark from a strong character to set the whole world aflame, as many are always willing to join the drama.
Abbigail Parris was the central figure to the hysteria throughout The Crucible, and she revels in the fact that she has the ability to create such a frenzy due to the intense conditioning she has received by the Puritan society to see herself as a powerless figure. She was lacking power as a result of her position in society and the circumstances through which she grew up. She was a woman in a world dominated by men. She has no parents, as they died in front of her, and though her caretaker (Samuel Parris) has power due to the fact that he was Reverend of the town church, she was unloved by her uncle and benefits little from her connection to him. Rather than living in the luxury that being under the …show more content…
The citizens were a repressed group, ruled by their religion, which is not as merciful as many today, and they had few outlets through which to relieve the pressures put upon them by their God and their community, so once they found a cause that was deemed “for the religion”, it became acceptable to murder and throw people into prison. Whatever moves the teenage Abby Parris made, hysteria followed, because once such a tension is built up, it takes a force equally as strong to stop it from destroying
Abbigail Parris was the central figure to the hysteria throughout The Crucible, and she revels in the fact that she has the ability to create such a frenzy due to the intense conditioning she has received by the Puritan society to see herself as a powerless figure. She was lacking power as a result of her position in society and the circumstances through which she grew up. She was a woman in a world dominated by men. She has no parents, as they died in front of her, and though her caretaker (Samuel Parris) has power due to the fact that he was Reverend of the town church, she was unloved by her uncle and benefits little from her connection to him. Rather than living in the luxury that being under the …show more content…
The citizens were a repressed group, ruled by their religion, which is not as merciful as many today, and they had few outlets through which to relieve the pressures put upon them by their God and their community, so once they found a cause that was deemed “for the religion”, it became acceptable to murder and throw people into prison. Whatever moves the teenage Abby Parris made, hysteria followed, because once such a tension is built up, it takes a force equally as strong to stop it from destroying