Crucible Homework page 83-98

Quote 1: "There lurks nowhere in your heart, nor hidden in your spirit, any desire 'to undermine this court?" - Danforth (page 90)

Explanation: Here Danforth is questioning the Proctor's motives to free his wife. And in his question he brings up the words, "undermining this court." This is a sign that Danforth is worried about people questioning his verdicts and is showing his resentment for Proctor 's appeal to over turn his arrest of Proctor's wife.

Question: Is Danforth a fair judge or is he driven by his own bias?

Quote 2: "But you understand, sir, that a person is either with this court or he must be counted against it, there be no road between" -Danforth (page 94)

Explanation: This excerpt comes from Danforth's response to when Francis stated that he did not want to bring trouble on those who signed a paper acknowledging the purity of Martha, Elizabeth, and Rebecca. In the quote a Danforth states that in this crisis, there is no gray area but only a black and white area. This quote also shows Danforth's resentment to those opposing the verdicts of the court, because he is openly admitting this idea that you are either with him or against him. And what can be taken from this is that those trying to challenge Judge Danforth's verdict (Francis, John, Giles) will be punished for it. This underlines the main theme of the story of people doing everything  in their power to defend their reputation.

Question: Knowing his position on people oppossing his verdicts, will Danforth free any of the accused?

crucible homework page 68-83

Quote 1: Conjures me? Why, no, sir, I am entirely myself, I think. Let you ask Susanna Walcott- she saw me sewin' it in court. OR BETTER STILL: Ask Abby, Abby sat beside me when I made it" -Mary Warren (page 76)

Explanation: In the quote above, Mary Warren is listing people that can testify to her making the poppet in which is said to have been used by Elizabeth as a weapon against Abigail. But right in the quote it is made clear that Abigail is quite aware of Mary Warren's creating of the poppet and most likely the placement of the needle in which she said she was stabbed. A hole is made in Abigail's accusation but only Proctor and Elizabeth are aware of this due to them being one of the few who now the crucial grudges held between Abigail and Elizabeth.

Question: How can this be used to support John Proctor's case in court that Abigail is being deceitful about her accusations of witch craft?

Quote 2: "If she is innocent! Why do you never wonder if Parris be innocent, or Abigail? I s the accuser always holy now? Were they born this morning as clean as God's fingers? I'll tell you what's walking Salem- vengeance is walking Salem. are what we always were in Salem, but now the little crazy children are jangling the keys of the kingdom, and common vengeance writes the law! This warrant's vengeance! I'll not give my wife to vengeance!" -Proctor (page 77)

Explanation: John Proctor, in the quote above, is acknowledging the fact that for the past week those that have actually been accusing people (aka Abigail) have been considered to be truthful in their accusations and that their word is fact. While those accused are given choice of admiting to the witchcraft or death. And with this benefit of complete trust in the accusers, the accusers are given the power to decide the fate of a person, death or infamy. And in the case of Abigail, vengence.

Question: Why does everyone in the village give their full trust to these accusations, even though they lack the proper evidence to support them?

crucible homework page 49-67

Quote 1: "I'm- I am an official of the court, they say... I'll not stand whipping any more! They Devil's loose in Salem Mr, Proctor; we must discover where he's hiding" -Mary Warren (page 59).

Explanation: In the quote above Mary Warren makes her rising importance and her so called duty to help find the devil known to the Proctors. But in all reality we see that she as Abigail is doing, is taking advantage of the situation by using it as a means to gain importance in the village by using the devil as a tool to either whiten or blacken people.

Question: What does Mary Warren have to gain from her rising status as an "official?"

Quote 2: "I am a stranger here, as you know. And in my ignorance I find it hard to draw a clear opinion of them that come accused before the court. And so this afternoon, and now tonight, I go from house to house" -Hale (page 63-64).

Explanation: Here we see that Reverend Hale, here is also a person seeking to find the devil as does Mary Warren. In the quote above, we see that Reverend Hale has a sincere desire to find the devil by going house to house to make sure those convicted are real witches.

Question: What is the difference between Reverend Hale and Mary Warren and their call to hunt out the devil an his worshipers?

crucible homework page 36-49

Character List

• Reverend Parris: Father of Betty Parris, Overbearing, paranoid.
• Betty Parris: daughter of Betty Parris, ill, also miraculously recovers and blames multiple people of witch craft.
• Abigail: niece of Reverend Parris, infatuated with John Proctor, 18 year old, friends with Mercy and Mary, blames multiple people of witch craft.
• John Proctor: affair with Abigail, farmer, hates hypocrites, even tempered, "morally corrupt."
• Elizabeth Proctor: wife of John Proctor, has dislike for Abigail due to affair.
• Thomas Putnam: arrogant, condescending, embittered, bad blood with the Nurse Clan
• Ann Putnam: wife of Thomas Putnam, gave birth to eight children 7 of whom died (she blames supernatural powers).
• Giles Corey: eighty year old farmer who is blamed for most of the town's hardships, nuisance but an innocent and brave man.
• Martha Corey: wife of Giles Corey, reads mysterious books.
• Francis Nurse: bad blood with the Putnams, respected man among peers.
• Rebecca Nurse: wife of Francis Nurse, bad blood with the Putnams.
• Mercy: Putnam's servant, merciless, sly, fat, 18 years old, friends with Abigail and Mercy.
• Mary Warren: subservient, naive, lonely, friends with Mercy and Abigail.
• Tituba: slave of Reverend Parris, Barbados person, accused of associating with the devil, blames multiple people of witch craft.
• Reverend Hale: considered an expert of diagnosing and fighting witch craft, comes to the village to diagnose Betty, starts a witch hunt.

Quotes:

1. "You are God's instument put in our hands to discover the Devil's agents among us, You are selected, Tituba, you are chosen to help us cleanse our village. So speak utterly, Tituba, turn your back on him and face God- face God, Tituba, and God will protect you" (page 46).

Explanation: This quote shows that all accusations of people being blamed of witch craft and association with the devil are not based on facts but are based on the testimony of bias and hateful people.

Question: Why would they trust a person accused of associating with the devil to point other people that associate with the devil?

2. Said with a tasty love of intellectual pursuit: "Here is all the invisible world, caught, defined, and calculated. In these books the Devil stands stripped of all his brute disguises. Here are all your familiar spirits...have no fear now- we shall find him out if he has come among us, and I mean to crush him utterly if he has shown his face!" -Hale (page 39)

Explanation: This quote shows Hale's belief that that the problem is witch craft and that it will be solved with his intellectual wit. Also this quote suggests that there is a science to identify witches. Even though they pretty much use the testimony of two alleged witches that could have lied to identify the other witches.

Question: If he had all these books that could help identify witches why did he request the help of Tituba?

Crucible homework pages 20 to 36

"The necessity of the Devil may become evident as a weapon, a weapon designed and used time and time again every age to whip men into a surrender to a particular church or church state" (Miller 34).

Explanation: This quote explains how the Devil can be used as a weapon to force people to join the church. Its revelence to this story is that by calling people witches and incorporating people with the devil people can be coarsed to live the puritanical life that society wants them to live.


"Our oppisites are always robed in sexual sin, and it is from this unconcious conviction that demonology gains both its attractive sensuality and its capacity to infuriate and frighten" (Miller 36).

Explanation: Here the author explains how the "enemy" is always included with sexual sin, making it seem so enticing and sensual yet evil and maniacal. This sensual evilness is related to the story because the characters view witchcraft as mysterious and evil, yet it has this alluring aspect. It is mysterious and intriguing. This mysteriousness and intrigue is what makes them fear witchcraft so much because they fail to understand its mysteries and their interest in it. So they incorporate it with evil because they cannot explain it.

Questions:
Why did Abigail and Proctor cut their relationship?

How might the family rivalries in the town affect the witchcraft theories? And why?

crucible homework

1. Narrator: "So it is not surprising to find that so many accusations against people are in the handwriting of Thomas Putnam... or that his daughter led the crying out at the most opportunate junctures of the trials, especailly when-" pg 15

In the quote above it is made clear that Thomas Putnam has made many accusations against other people and has spoken poorly about others. And that his daughter in the future will accuse others of wrong doings. But the quote is cut off at "especially when-" posing the question, "At what vital point did she interject her so called testimony of heresy.

2. Mary Warren: "What's got her? Abby, she's going to die! It's a sin to conjure, and we-" (pg 20)

This quatation is a perfect example of the common belief of the time that "witch craft" existed and that it was considered a sin. This quote also cuts off short at the word "we," so it is made clear that Mary and Abigail are some how involved with this "witch craft" that has hurt Betty. But this leads us to the question, "What did they do?"

Class Work

Reverend Parris- middle aged father, overbearing, condescending: "He believed he was being persecuted wherever he went... he felt insulted if someone rose to shut the door without first asking his permission."

Betty Parris- daughter, sick: "Reverend Parris... his daughter, Betty Parris, aged ten, lying in bed, inert."

Martha Corey- adulterous, sketchy: "It suddenly beccam possible for a man to say that Martha Corey had come into his bedroom at night, and that, while his wife was sleeping at his side, Martha laid herself down on his chest and "nearly suffocated him."

Tituba- caring, slave, concerned, cautious: "She enters as one does who can no longer bear to be barred from the sight of her beloved, but she is also very frightened because her slave sense has warned her that, as always, trouble in this house eventually lands on her back."

Info:

The story takes place in Salem Massachusetts during the salem witch trials. This story is based off a true story but most of the details that provided by this book are fiction. The general plot idea is borrowed from historical events but the story itself is partly taken from letters and trial records and the large remainder from the authors imagination.

Basically we know that the general plot of story would follow what we knew happened during the trials. But the dialogues and the interactions that occur among the characters of the book will be solely the creation of the author and whatever he thought might have happened during the trial will be how the story is written.