The Crucible Archetypes

Aristotle states that "The change in a hero's fortunes be not from misery to happiness, but...from happiness to misery, and the cause...must not lie in any depravity but in some great error on his part.” The unity of setting; fate (or determinism); a noble character, with the inevitability of human flaw - these factors are archetypal of the classical tragedies, first made popular by notable Sophocles, Euripides, and Aeschylus. Arthur Miller adopts this structure in his play, The Crucible: a tragedy, in which John Proctor is the epitome of an Aristotelian tragic hero. The Crucible is presented in a superstitious village, located in Salem, Massachusetts, in 1692. The time frame is compressed, and the action a fast pace. There is thus an unifying