Zusammenfassung der Ressource
THE CRUCIBLE - Arthur Miller
- Context
- Examines witch hunts that took place in 17th
Century Salem, Massachusetts.
- Early settlers in N.America had fled
from religious prosecution in England
and Europe
- Intense about religious purity - lived simple
lives in small, claustrophobic communities.
- Modern standards -
'religious fanatics'
- Intolerant of
alternative viewpoints
- Subtly refers to 'communist witch
hunts' in USA, 1950s
- 1950s America went through a period of intense fear of
the spread of the anti-capitalist economic system,
communism.
- The government organised an investigation to identify
communists and eradicate their positions of influence. Often
referred to as 'communist witch hunt'.
- Written when Miller was already
successful playwright
- The author - Miller
- Jewish parents were both immigrants from Poland. They came
to America at a time when people were looking for the
economic and religious freedom of 'the American dream'.
- Link to puritans fmigrating to Salem to
practice religion and way of life freely
- Miller's family were well off until the
financial crisis in America (wall street crash)
in 1920s. Huge impact upon ruined family,
affected young Arthur.
- He viewed it as the failure of the
American dream and of the Capitalist
economic system on which his family
had built their hopes of a better life.
- Capitalism focuses on the individual and capital (money)
- The Pigs, led by Napoleon, ordering jam and
focousing on increased profits on the farm
- Miller himself appeared before the House committee of
Un-American Activities in 1956. as did many of his
influential writer and theatre friends.
- Underlying themes
- Portrays witch hunting as something deep within the origins of the American
society. Miller shows the witch hunting arising from a variety of motives;
unbounded fear, jealousy and revenge.
- Scape goating/landing blame
- It portrayed an ugly and unflattering
image of American society and the human
condition
- Far from the way that Americans and
humanity like to view themselves.