John Proctor Essay

This description adds an air of mystery to him – he seems subversive and breeds paranoia, which is bound to encourage the audience to dislike him. This unpleasantness about him rubs off on the characters who side with him such as Parris, Danforth and Abigail, and hence rubs off on the society that gets caught up in his hysterical witch-hunt. Similarly to Proctor therefore, we feel alienated from this society, so different to our own. So while characters such as Hale may be portrayed as popular in the community, and therefore as good citizens following the teachings of their society, the audience sees Proctor as a good man. Furthermore, as the audience comes to dislike this society more and more, partly due to Hale’s influence upon it, and as the events of the play become more serious, our disgust with Salem as a society grows. This leads us to side even more with the characters that are portrayed as ‘good people’ (not only Proctor, but those accused of witchcraft more generally such as Rebecca Nurse and Elizabeth Proctor) and against the ‘good citizens’. This is simply due to the fact that the ‘good citizens’ chose to distinguish themselves from the ‘good people’ in the eyes of the audience by accusing them of witchcraft, thus forcing us to side against them. However, the audience’s sympathy with Proctor is perhaps not absolute. In his relationship/interaction with Elizabeth, we may find a darker, less appealing side to Proctor. When we first meet her, Elizabeth is â€Å"softly singing to the children†. She obeys John’s orders, seeming mild, sweet and gentle. This serves to instantly ingratiate her with the audience. But similarly, she gains our sympathy. She has the air of a repressed housewife. In obeying John’s every command, Elizabeth appeals to the hearts of the modern liberal audience living in an age of comparative equality. Everything down to the way she laments â€Å"Pray God. I hurt my heart to strip her, poor rabbit† makes her ever more sweet and sensitive and worthy of sympathy in the eyes of the audience. Because of the audience’s sympathies with Elizabeth, when Proctor begins to grow angry and shout at her, for the first time we are encouraged to side against Proctor. Elizabeth, seeming weak and sensitive plays on our sympathies, so when John shouts â€Å"Woman †¦ I’ll not have your suspicion any more†, the audience sees her as the victim of the ‘bully’, John. Even then however, John manages to redeem himself. Elizabeth’s sweetness does seem to have an effect on him. Eventually, he recognises Elizabeth for the good woman she is, and when he comes to resolve his inner battle between truth and life, he values her opinion above all others. He appears therefore, to be a man of some compassion. He begs her to judge him, something that he had rejected bitterly before then, and was the source of their original argument. In his own words â€Å"You are a – marvel, Elizabeth†. In Proctor’s struggle at the end of the play – his choice between a virtuous death and a haunted life – we see open, frank and emotional expressions of his goodness and compassion. Indeed, it is here that we see the true evidence that John Proctor really is a good man. Here, for the first time, he openly recognises his flaws – â€Å"I cannot mount the gibbet a saint †¦ Nothing’s spoiled by giving them this lie that wasn’t rotten long before†. The audience now recognises him as a man of great humanity, who will own up to his past sins. Furthermore, his benevolence shines through in his recognition of Elizabeth as a better person than he. This is most prominently displayed in his desperation to be judged by her. He recognises her goodness and begs forgiveness, and when she sullies her own name his pain is most apparent: â€Å"PROCTOR (In great pain): Enough, enough – ELIZABETH (Now pouring out her heart): Better you should know me! PROCTOR: I will not hear it! I know you! † Never before has Proctor used such emotion as this, denoted by the short sentences, exclamation marks and short bursts of pained speech. It is clear that he loves Elizabeth above all other things, and would willingly die for her to think better of him. He is a man of true compassion and love. But most revealing of his good nature is Proctor’s ultimate choice. When it comes down to it, he cannot lie. As he tries to give the confession, he has great trouble in physically saying it. His jaws lock, we are told, as if God himself were intervening to stop a good Christian from sullying his name. His confession is short, pained and brief. He cannot bear to elaborate, simply uttering â€Å"I did †¦ He did† in answer to the charges against him. It is too much for this good man. He cannot darken his soul to save his life. He would rather die a good and honest Christian, than live a lie and stoop so low as those who interrogate and imprison him. It is here that he proves himself truly heroic, as he rises above the hypocrisy of Salem and dies a martyr to the cause of good and truth, and this he recognises himself – â€Å"I do think I see some shred of goodness in John Proctor. † Clearly then, John Proctor is absolutely the central character of ‘The Crucible’. He is purposely detached from Salem society and moulded into the key to a play with a deeper underlying meaning. In many ways he represents Miller himself, and shares a viewpoint with the modern audience, providing a window into a very different world. In order to do this it is vital that the audience sympathises entirely with his plight. His respectable and likeable character draws the audience to him, before Miller pits both him and us against the misguided witch-hunters – Miller’s own House Un-American Activities Committee. We side and sympathise with Proctor, just as Miller requires us to side and sympathise with him, before a greater evil. 6 1 Show preview only The above preview is unformatted text This student written piece of work is one of many that can be found in our GCSE Arthur Miller section. Download this essay Print Save Not the one?