Because it is my name! Because I cannot have another in my life! Because I lie and sign myself to lies! Because I am not worth the dust on the feet of them that hang! How may I live without my name? I have given you my soul; leave me my name!
In a small tight-knit community, gossip and rumour spread like wildfire, inflaming personal grievances until no-one is safe from accusation and vengeance.

The Crucible is Arthur Miller's classic dramatisation of the witch-hunt and trials that besieged the Puritan community of Salem in 1692. Seen as a chilling parallel to the McCarthyism and repressive culture of fear that gripped America in the 1950s, the play's timeless relevance and appeal remains as strong as when the play opened on Broadway in 1953.
This new edition includes an introduction by Soyica Diggs Colbert, that explores the play's production history as well as the dramatic, thematic, and academic debates that surround it; a must-have resource for any student exploring The Crucible.

Arthur Miller was born in New York City in 1915. After graduating from the University of Michigan, he began work with the Federal Theatre Project. His first Broadway hit was All My Sons, closely followed by Death of a Salesman, The Crucible and A View from the Bridge. His other writing includes Focus, a novel; The Misfits, first published as a short story, then as a cinema novel; In Russia, In the Country, Chinese Encounters (all in collaboration with his wife, photographer Inge Morath) and 'Salesman' in Beijing, non-fiction; and his autobiography, Timebends, published in 1987. Among his other plays are: Incident At Vichy, The Creation of the World and Other Business, The American Clock, The Last Yankee, and Resurrection Blues. His novella, Plain Girl, was published in 1995 and his second collection of short stories, Presence, in 2007. He died in February 2005 aged eighty-nine.

Chronology


Introduction

Historical, Social and Cultural Contexts

Genre and Themes

Play as Performance

Production History

Academic Debate

Behind the scenes - Interview with Set Designer Soutra Gilmore on The Old Vic production of The Crucible, directed by Yaël Farber

Further Study


The Crucible


Notes