Persuasive Essay about John Proctor (The Crucible)
Uploaded by Melania on Oct 27, 2008
John Proctor
In The Crucible, Arthur Miller’s utilization of John Proctor’s round character is to persuade the audience that John Proctor represents ethos, metonymy, and allusion.
One way Miller persuades the audience through John Proctor’s character is through ethical appeal. Miller uses ethos by relating John Proctor to an innocent, normal person during the McCarthy communism trials. Miller gives John Proctor’s round character values and beliefs that he follows throughout the four acts. Even though John Proctor had a relationship with Abigail Williams, he cares more for his wife and children. The audience can reminisce about how they care for their wife and children too. John Proctor is a Christian, but he does not attend church every Sabbath Day for his own reasons. This belief can relate to the audience who is watching or reading the play. Even though Arthur Miller does not make John Proctor a dynamic character, he does relate the character to the audience by using speaker credibility. John Proctor’s character chooses his words carefully when he is speaking to authority figures, like saying “...I have no witness and cannot prove it, except my word be taken. But I know the children’s sickness had naught to do with witchcraft.”
Arthur Miller helps develop the character of John Proctor by using metonymy. Miller directly characterizes John Proctor by expanding his description to include people with similar personalities. When Miller directly characterizes John Proctor, he states, “In Proctor’s presence a fool felt his foolishness instantly—and a Proctor is always marked for calumny therefore.” The dictionary definition for the word ‘proctor’ is ‘an overseer.’ Therefore, Miller refers to all individuals who stand up to the inadequacies of society as ‘Proctors,’ like the audience relating their own life to the play.
Lastly, Arthur Miller depicts John Proctor’s character by using allusion. Miller emphasizes his theme or morality versus social pressure with many allusions in the play from historical to social. The allusion pertaining to John Proctor was the post World War II “Red Scare,” an event that caused mass hysteria in the United States. When Abigail Williams pushes John Proctor to the breaking point where he goes to jail, he has a choice whether to admit to witchcraft or not. John Proctor does not admit to witchcraft, causing him to get executed. John Proctor represents...