Analysis Of The Tragic Hero In The Crucible By Arthur Miller

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Tragic heroes in the English Literary Community has change over time. The classic tragic hero is a nobleman who suffers from a tragic flaw which brings his downfall after an epiphany. For example, Romeo from Romeo and Juliet, or Oedipus from the play Oedipus. These men in power reveal attributes of the tragic hero. However, Arthur Miller questions why only a monarch can be a tragic hero. Miller wrote the play, The Crucible, featuring a common man, John Proctor, put into an extraordinary situation of being accused of witchcraft in Salem during the 1600’s. As Arthur Miller exposes the corruption that fear installs with the authority of men in power, he also argues how the common man is just as apt a subject of being a tragic hero as any king …show more content…
To make one aware, Abigail used to work for them as a servant and or maid during the time when Elizabeth Proctor grew ill. She was then fired when Elizabeth found out about the situation, and the couple is a few months after the adultery occurred. Since then, John Proctor has been giving his wife the space she needs, but her heart has been broken for a little too long: “I have gone tiptoe in this house all seven months...I have not moved from there to there without I think to please you, and still and everlasting funeral marches around your heart” (Miller Crucible 52). John Proctor was a poetic and passionate man. The metaphor and personification amplifies her sorrow, and his failure to make her happy again. While seeking forgiveness, he attempts to find his place in his world, which is an important factor to being a tragic hero that Miller explained in his essay: “the underlying struggle is that of the individual attempting to gain his “rightful” position in his society..Sometimes he is one who is displaced from it” (Miller Tragedy 1). Proctor indeeds suffers from finding his placement after his corruption. Ever since Proctor became a lecher, he struggled with his pride and guilt, which lead him to this downward spiral of needing judgement on him and those who surround …show more content…
Miller provides his definition as “Tragedy, then, is the consequence of a man’s total compulsion to evaluate himself justly” (Miller Tragedy 1), which John Proctor continuously did until judgment day. Anyone can be a tragic hero, because everyone suffers from misplacement and pride. A tragic flaw is only a flaw due to the destruction it created; however, it should not be a flaw to defend one’s name against what challenges that name. It is a flaw to accept tragedy and failure. Miller succeeds to provide the English Literary Community a tragic hero, to all extents, born a

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