The Crucible

Abstract

As the title suggests, the central action of The Crucible is comparable to the purification of a substance by heat. John Proctor undergoes a metaphorical calcination in the course of which he is reduced to his essential, purified self. The movement of the play is reductive, stripping the central character of layers of protective covering until in the end he stands naked — totally exposed. It is a dramatic pattern very different from the conventional design of Greek or Christian tragedy. In these latter, the hero’s suffering is seen to bear a direct relationship to some ‘flaw’ or error of judgement for which he must accept some responsibility. Usually, too, this suffering leads to some kind of insight into the inevitable relationship between character and fate, and to an acceptance on the part of the protagonist and the audience of the ultimate justice of fate. Miller’s play, while it subjects the central character to suffering as great as any tragedy, does so to different effect. Proctor’s story is not one of defeat and acceptance, but of triumph and vindication. Whereas the conventional tragic hero is a deluded or obsessed individual in an ordered universe, Proctor is a just man in a universe gone mad.