The Crucible
The Crucible Study Guide Questions
Amy Pham
Act I - An Overture
Describe the personality of Reverend Samuel Parris. Reverend Parris believed he was being persecuted wherever he went, despite his best efforts to win people and God to his side. He was a widower with no interest in children, or talent in them. He never conceived that they were anything but thankful for being permitted to walk straight, eyes slightly lowered, arms at the sides, and mouths shut until bidden to speak. He is described to have cut a “villainous path, and there is very little good to be said for him.” Describe the life in the town of Salem, Massachusetts in 1692. Salem was a barbaric frontier inhabited by a sect of fanatics who were shipping out products of slowly increasing quantity and value to the European world. Salem’s creed forbade anything resembling a theater or “vain enjoyment.” The town was very centered around the idea of prayer. Hard work kept the town’s morals from spoiling, for the people were forced to fight the land like heroes for every grain of corn, and no man had very much time for fooling around. Personal privacy was taken quite lightly in Salem, for the people believed that it was their duty to mind people’s business. How did the men who settled Salem differ from those who settled in Virginia? The people and church of Salem found it necessary to deny any other sect its freedom (their fathers had been persecuted in England) lest their New Jerusalem be defiled and corrupted by wrong ways and deceitful ideas. They believed that they held the candle that would light the world. They were dedicated folk and they had to be to survive the life they had chosen or been born into in this country. People of Jamestown in Virginia were the complete opposite. The Englishmen who landed there were motivated mainly by a hunt for profit. They had thought to pick off the wealth of the new country and then return rich to England. They were individualists and tried to kill off the
Amy Pham
Act I - An Overture
Describe the personality of Reverend Samuel Parris. Reverend Parris believed he was being persecuted wherever he went, despite his best efforts to win people and God to his side. He was a widower with no interest in children, or talent in them. He never conceived that they were anything but thankful for being permitted to walk straight, eyes slightly lowered, arms at the sides, and mouths shut until bidden to speak. He is described to have cut a “villainous path, and there is very little good to be said for him.” Describe the life in the town of Salem, Massachusetts in 1692. Salem was a barbaric frontier inhabited by a sect of fanatics who were shipping out products of slowly increasing quantity and value to the European world. Salem’s creed forbade anything resembling a theater or “vain enjoyment.” The town was very centered around the idea of prayer. Hard work kept the town’s morals from spoiling, for the people were forced to fight the land like heroes for every grain of corn, and no man had very much time for fooling around. Personal privacy was taken quite lightly in Salem, for the people believed that it was their duty to mind people’s business. How did the men who settled Salem differ from those who settled in Virginia? The people and church of Salem found it necessary to deny any other sect its freedom (their fathers had been persecuted in England) lest their New Jerusalem be defiled and corrupted by wrong ways and deceitful ideas. They believed that they held the candle that would light the world. They were dedicated folk and they had to be to survive the life they had chosen or been born into in this country. People of Jamestown in Virginia were the complete opposite. The Englishmen who landed there were motivated mainly by a hunt for profit. They had thought to pick off the wealth of the new country and then return rich to England. They were individualists and tried to kill off the