The Crucible-A Summary

Arthur Miller, the author of the play "The Crucible" was born in 1915 in New York. He is one of the most well know Playwrights of his time. He is most well know for his play "Death of a Salesman" for which he won the Pulitzer Prize in 1949. "The Crucible," which is also a well know play of Miller's, was written to "Explore the threshold between individual gilt and mass hysteria, personal spite and collective evil."






The Crucible is a historic play based on the Witchcraft trials at Salem. The story takes place in 1692 in a small Puritan villiage of Massachusetts. It is a suspence filled with evils and the trials of personal concience.

The play begins in the home of Reverend Samuel Parris where he lives with his daughter Betty, his neice of 17, Abigail, and their slave, Tituba. His daughter Betty has fallen sick. Parris has called for the help of Reverend Hale, believeing the cause of her illness to be of a supernatural explanation. Betty's sickness arose when P...