John Proctor is both a real person and a fictional one in a play. The real John Proctor was a 60 year old man. The fictional version of him was a man in his thirties. In the real world, John couldn't have possibly had an affair with Abigail Williams, as she was only 12 at the time. But, in both versions, it ends the same way: John Proctor gets accused for witchcraft and hangs. This post will be talking about the fictional John Proctor in The Crucible.
In the beginning, John Proctor is a respected farmer with 3 sons and a wife. There are many faults however, such as him not going to church as often as he could because of his disapproval of the church's pastor, Parris. His biggest fault is his affair with Abigail Williams, who is 16-17 years old in the play. As the play progresses and more and more people are being accused of witchcraft, Proctor's wife, Elizabeth, gets accused by Abigail. When Proctor gets a chance to free his wife in exchange for revoking his charge on the court, he declines because his friends' wives are also being accused. This is his first act of heroism.
Eventually, Proctor decides to come clean to the court about his affair with Abigail, in order to prove that Abigail is not with God and that her claims are false. When Elizabeth gets called into court to say whether or not this is true, she lies in order to protect Proctor. Throughout the course of the play, Mary Warren sides with Abigail and turns against Proctor, claiming that Proctor has been performing witchcraft.
Proctor is then forced to either plead guilty to witchcraft and falsely accuse someone else of witchcraft, or be tried by hanging. Elizabeth pleads with Proctor to sign a confession so that he can live. But in the end, Proctor decides to stick to his Puritan beliefs and rips up the confession. In the end, John Proctor dies a true Puritan. He stays true to his morals and is pure in the very end. John Proctor is a hero.
I think you did a good job using supporting evidence to back up your argument. Unlike most other blogs, you mentioned the fact that he refuses Danforth's deal because it would result in more people being accused. I think you bring up a good point about dying a true Puritan because most in the town are forgetting their religious beliefs. Just by the way though, Elizabeth does not actually plead with Proctor to sign the confession. She actually doesn't want him to falsely confess.
ReplyDeleteI think you did a good job using supporting evidence to back up your argument. Unlike most other blogs, you mentioned the fact that he refuses Danforth's deal because it would result in more people being accused. I think you bring up a good point about dying a true Puritan because most in the town are forgetting their religious beliefs. Just by the way though, Elizabeth does not actually plead with Proctor to sign the confession. She actually doesn't want him to falsely confess.
ReplyDeleteMy question to you is this: Since he was a "bad" Puritan before the witchcraft began, can he really die a "good" Puritan? We saw in "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" (and the Crucible as well) that the Puritans really don't believe in forgiveness, which would imply that his faults from before the witchcraft trials would prevent him from dying a good Puritan.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I don't know if his ripping up the confession was him being a good Puritan or just a good person, as he really doesn't seem like a committed Puritan at all.
I don't exactly understand how you support your claim that his actions in the end and the reasons for actions before. Like Jonathon pointed out, it isn't in the Puritans' beliefs to forgive people, so I suppose he isn't really a "good" Puritan throughout the play no matter what he does.
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