 Now in The Crucible, the character of Abigail Williams is another important character that you need to be really familiar with. In fact, she's the catalyst that sets all of these really, really tragic events in motion because it is her desire for John Proctor, her desire to be his primary source of affection that causes her to begin these chants to really cast a spell on Elizabeth Proctor and ultimately this is now what causes the witchcraft trials to begin and she uses this as an opportunity to try and get Elizabeth killed. Now when we're watching this play, she's a really complex character because Abigail is somewhat of an anti-hero to some extent, however, we also can see some villainous elements in her. On the one hand, we as the audience should feel a sense of sympathy towards Abigail, her lust for John Proctor, her actions towards John Proctor, and even for example, when she's dancing in the woods with all the other girls, all of these can arguably be seen as a result of what is a very restricted Puritan society that can ultimately lead people if they're too repressed to really overexert their sexuality, so her unfettered sexuality to some degree is actually caused by her very restrictive Puritan society and the Puritan society that she lives within. Equally, Abigail is cast as an outcast, even if she's very powerful and she wields this power, she also understands her beauty, she's still seen as an outcast. Of course, the play begins with her being in some kind of disgrace, we don't quite know which type of disgrace until later on, but she's in a disgrace because of being fired by the Proctors as a servant and of course later on we find that it's because of an affair that she had with John Proctor. So she occupies a certain status as an outcast and also, of course, we learn that she is being looked after by Reverend Paris, she is his niece, she's 17 years old because she was orphaned and parents were killed in front of her by Native Americans, okay? So whilst we feel some sympathy for her because she perhaps needs love, she seeks this love and desire in the man of John Proctor, perhaps almost as a father figure. On the other hand, she is understanding of her beauty, her youth, and she uses this to manipulate people against Elizabeth Proctor. Also ultimately, not only does she deceive people and she leads to all of these different deaths of people who've been wrongly accused of rich craft, but she stills Reverend Paris' money and runs off with mercy. So of course, also that is the side of her that we see, which is very manipulative and very cunning and to some degree, again, there's some people who watch this play and see her because of that as somewhat of an antagonist, okay? However, I would say that when you're writing about Abigail's character, she's a very very interesting character. She's very complex and very complicated. We can't see her as black and white. She represents all the wrong things of the period in society and a restrictive society that restricts women's roles and her actions are a manifestation of this, but of course also we can't excuse her actions. So she's a very complex and complicated character. Now, as you can see behind me, I've prepared some quotes to remember when you're writing and talking about her character. Now, the first quotation is of course relating to in the opening where there is some rumours around her name and of course, she is really annoyed at how because she was fired by the Procters, there's some disgrace relating to her name and she states, there will be no blush about my name. Now, for this quotation, the key word level analysis you want to do for her character here is first the euphemism blush. This is a euphemism because of course blush is basically relating to disgrace. The other key word level analysis you want to do for this quotation is the pronoun Y and this pronoun emphasises firstly just how selfish Abigail is in terms of seeing things as tied to her. What can she do and how does this impact her? And of course, the second thing is that this foreshadows that her name is tied to something much darker and more sinister. It's tied to the adulterous affair that she has a drawn proctor and ultimately to the murder that she does indirectly by essentially stating that Elizabeth is a witch and trying to have her killed but ultimately, of course, this leads to John Procter's murder himself. The second quotation to relate to Abigail's character is when she's talking about Elizabeth Procter, when she's basically casting her off, no, no, no, no, she's a bitter woman, a lying, snivelling woman. This is the excuse that she gives as to why she was fired by the Procters because Elizabeth is very bitter and she's snivelling. And of course, she uses this as a convenient excuse to show that maybe Elizabeth is jealous of her beauty and her youth. Now, the word-level analysis you want to do here is the listing of these adjectives. So listing and we'll say this is a syndeton, so bitter, lying, snivelling. And of course, here she's trying to already disrepute Elizabeth Procter's character and she's trying to bring doubts in people's minds about the kind of person that Elizabeth is. The third quotation to remember with Abigail's character is firstly the stage directions she's described as being in a temper. And of course, you've got the noun here, temper to show that she's actually a very fiery and passionate character. She's actually a foil to Elizabeth Procter. Whilst Elizabeth Procter is very controlled, very stoic, Abigail is very fiery. She's really outwards in terms of expressing herself. Then, so after the stage directions in a temper, she states, my name is good about the village exclamation mark. And of course, here, in terms of word-level analysis you want to do, this is an exclamatory sentence. What this illustrates again is how Abigail is very, very keen to protect the idea that she is honourable as a person. And of course, also whilst she's keen to protect this, she's unable to withhold her emotion. So in contrast to Elizabeth Procter, Abigail is very, very passionate, indeed. Now, the other key quotation to remember with her character is when she's speaking to John Procter in Act 1 and she's trying to seduce him and she tells him, give me a word, John, a soft word. And of course here, you've got the verb give and also the repetition word, okay? And here she appears to be somewhat of a seductive femme fatale. And here we can also see that she really strongly desires John Procter. This is what leads her to try and cast a spell in order to get Elizabeth somehow out of the way so that John can really focus his desire on her. The other key quotation with Abigail's character is when she's stating, the lying lessons I was taught by Christian women. Now here, you want to focus on alliteration, lying and lessons. And this is interesting because this is her way of highlighting the hypocrisy that she was taught by Christian women and covenanted men and how she was taught these lessons and these misguided her. And of course, this is ironic because it's true, she has been taught by the best of the Puritans who are the biggest hypocrites from her eyes. And of course, these hypocrites are the ones who engage in these witchcraft trials which are basically fake. They are basically a guise, a disguise for them to gain power, maybe perhaps through property such as the Putnam's. And so this quotation is really powerful because it's highlighting the hypocrisy that existed within the Sadian society. But of course, Miller is using this context to also highlight the hypocrisy that exists within the House Committee of Un-American Activities when they were basically accusing people very falsely of communist ideas and communist ideology purely simply to just, it wasn't so much to protect Americans from communism, it was more for the individual advancements of people in terms of the careers and so on who worked in the HUAC. And of course, also it's a criticism of McCarthy himself. The other quotations to remember with Abigail's character is finally the stage directions which is crying to heaven and then she states, Oh heavenly Father, take away this shadow. And this is when Mary, and of course also John Proctor, tell everybody and reveal that not only did she have an adulterous affair with John Proctor, but Mary, she noticed that Mary was sowing the poppet and she used that as an excuse to try and state that Elizabeth used witchcraft to put a needle in her stomach. So she uses this as a way to distract others and she successfully distracts them. Now here, the one level analysis you want to do firstly is that in the stage directions crying to heaven, heaven is repeated so there's repetition of heaven here and then she states, Oh heavenly Father. Almost actually like the Lord's Prayer when we pray to the heavenly Father. Also the other one level analysis you want to do is take away this shadow and this is a metaphor. The shadow itself is Mary. So Abigail is using this as a way to state that Mary is putting casting a spell on the girls and this is what causes Mary to go crazy and then basically accuse John Proctor of being in league with the devil. So that's it when it comes to Abigail's character. However, do make sure that you talk about the complexity in her character. She's not black and white. She's not evil. She's not good. She is a very complicated and complex character and of course she shows the restrictions of her period in society, what this does to a woman. And of course also we can see that she's an orphan girl, someone without very many options as a woman. She ultimately also ends up as a prostitute again highlighting how few opportunities existed for women in Puritan society. That's it and thank you so much for listening.