The Crucible Comparison

The Crucible can relate to many songs especially between the relationship of John Proctor and Elizabeth, and several other events in the story. The song “Iris” by the Goo Goo Dolls is a perfect example of a song whose lyrics fits what is happening in the story. There are three lyrical examples that connect to John Proctor’s relationship with Elizabeth, Abigail’s relationship with Proctor, and all of the accused witches perspective during the Salem witch trails.

From the start John Proctor and Elizabeth’s relationship was on the edge because John had committed adultery. Their relationship wasn’t perfect and it seemed like John was always trying to win back Elizabeth’s love. She continued to get sad whenever the subject of Abigail came up and when John was alone with Abigail for a “moment” (51) Elizabeth “suddenly lost all faith in him” (51). With this shaky relationship I decided that the lyrics that best suited this was “And I don't want the world to see me, Cause I don't think that they'd understand.” Observing the first line (“And…me”) we can see that it says “and I don’t want the world to see me” which seems like John is saying this to Abigail. He is trying to tell Elizabeth that he is ashamed of committing adultery and that it is such a bad thing to do, especially during that time period. John just doesn’t want anyone else to look at him bad because he already has his wife, the one that he loves the most, not trusting him. The meaning of that line is that he wants to stay away from other people treating him the way that Elizabeth has, “hurt, and very coldly” (51). The next line (“Cause…understand”) talks about how no can really understand what John is going through right now with Abigail and his wife. It seems that the only person that could understand what John is going through is someone else who has committed adultery, because at the time he wasn’t receiving any support form his wife. At this part of their relationship she said “I see what I see, John” (52), basically saying that she is going off of what had happened in the past rather than listening to what John has to say now.

Another piece of the puzzle that needs to be looked is the relationship between John Proctor and Abigail. This was a very weird and interesting relationship where Abigail was this crazy girl in love with John and pretty much obsessed with him. She wanted him so badly and she tried to get him back by talking to him and saying “you loved me, and you love me now” (21). While on the other hand Proctor doesn’t want anything to do with Abigail because he wants to move on and spend his time with Elizabeth. He tells Abigail “I’ll not be comin’ for you no more” (21) to make sure that they are both on the same page, but Abigail just can’t move on. For this relationship I picked out the lyrics “And all I can taste is this moment, and all I can breathe is your life, Cause sooner or later it's over, I just don't want to miss you tonight.” Looking at the first line (“And…life”), it says “and all I can taste is this moment, and all I can breathe is your life.” What this means is that Abigail is putting all of her feelings on the table for John to take right now, because she doesn’t see anything but him. She was focusing all of her attention to John and living off of the moments that they were together saying “I look for the John Proctor that took me from my sleep and put knowledge in my heart” (22). The following quote, “Cause sooner or later it’s over, and I don’t want to miss you tonight” relates to Abigail’s knowledge on how the Salem witch trails and to Proctor. She is saying that all of the trails can end anytime, yet when that time comes she wants Proctor to be with her so she wouldn’t have to miss him for another night. It all revolves around how she is totally in love with John and she would do anything for him and to get him back.

Life was hard and rough for the many accused people in The Crucible, which made them look at everything in a different perspective. It all started off with Abigail accusing basically every woman that she either didn’t even know or just hated, such as Elizabeth. Abigail accused Elizabeth, where John tried to tell Judge Danforth that “She [Abigail] thinks to dance with me on my wife’s grave” (102). This lyrical quote “When everything seems like the movies, Yeah you bleed just to know you’re alive” describes how the accused are feeling. The start of the quote (“When…movies”) talks about how in the movies when you watch some type of horror film there always seems to be a bad ending where there might be a solution but even with that solution harm has been done already. That connects to the story where everything is going bad and the accused are worried but at the end there is an overall better ending, which was the stop of the witch trials. The final line (“Yeah…alive”) tells us that during this time everything was out of control and that it just didn’t seem like reality. It had become so unreal that the accused were searching for something that showed them that they were sane and not crazy.

Living during the time period of the Salem witch trials was a hard time for everybody where you either had personal problems at home or accused of being a witch. Whatever the case may have been the song “Iris” helps us understand what was happening between John Proctor’s relationship with Elizabeth, Abigail’s relationship with Proctor, and of all of the accused witches perspectives.