#I’m a writer who has grown attached to this play and especially this chatacter

[lil-oreo-crumbles]

As much as I appreciate the historical context of what actually happened during the Salem Witch Trials and what it brings to the table when discussing The Crucible, I hate it when it’s brought up during my discussions with others about the play.

As a huge defender and unapologetic lover of Abigail Williams, and someone who tends to hyperfocus on the aspect of The Crucible involving her and the John Proctor affair plot, she’s the topic that’s the most relevant when this happens. I hate it when I’m happily discussing the play and going through her characterization and backstory, along with the uncomfortable aspects of the Proctor affair, and someone brings up history. “You know that she was 11 in history and John Proctor was in his 60s, so the affair never actually happened, right?”

Yes. I know. I’m aware.

We can iron out and discuss all of the weird implications in Arthur Miller aging Abigail up and aging John down to enhance the dramatic (fictional) affair between the two of them all we want, but that is a different discussion entirely. I don’t appreciate it when it’s lumped in during a discussion of the text itself. Yes, I know Abigail was 11 in history, but I’m not talking about that Abigail Williams. I’m talking about the 17 year old Abigail Williams portrayed in The Crucible, a fictional character. A character who I read as fictional. The play isn’t history; it was never supposed to be history. It was supposed to be a parallel to the mass hysteria happening around the time it was written: The Red Scare, McCarthyism, and the Hollywood Blacklist. A mass hysteria that Miller drew parallels to the Salem Witch Trials. The affair was added for dramatics, to make the story more compelling and add personal motivation to Abigail leading the girls to accuse the supposed “witches” of Salem. It’s supposed to reflect history, not be a 1 for 1 retelling of historical events.

The Crucible is a piece of fiction, a story, and when I speak about it I’m talking exclusively about it as a piece of fiction. The Abigail I discuss is the Abigail in The Crucible with the given personality and backstory the play provides.

I frankly do not give a shit about the real Abigail Williams when talking about The Crucible’s Abby, she’s irrelevant and almost completely removed from this variant of her. The version of Abigail in my Crucible rewrite “Salem’s Bond” is taken exclusively from The Crucible with no ties to reality.

The Crucible is a piece of fiction, and when talking about it I intend to treat it as such, and only bring up history when relevant.