Character and Action

  • Proctor
  • Mary
  • Elizabeth

Summary:

  • Mary Warren comes back from Salem and Proctor gets furious at her because he is against all the witchcraft trials and he told her he cannot go there.
  • Mary Warren claims she is sick (because of the devil).
  • Mary Warren gives a doll to Elizabeth as a gift which she made.
  • Mary breaks the news that ‘Goody Osburn will hang.’
  • She also says that Sarah Good confessed to witchcraft.
  • Good Osburn is pregnant, so she will not hang, could be foreshadowing what is going to happen to Elizabeth.
  • Mary feels as if she has gained some power through all the trials.
  • Mary tells John Proctor and Elizabeth that Elizabeth has been accused of witchcraft by Abigail.

Themes and context

Power/status:

‘’I am bound by law, I cannot tell it.’’– Mary says this to Proctor and feels she has got power, now she is with the law, and important to the court.

‘’I’ll not be ordered to bed no more, Mr Proctor! I am eighteen and a women, however single!’’– context: A women of Mary’s status would not talk to their master like that- this shows how much power the girls and Mary felt they had.

‘’ (He starts for his rifle).’’

Religion:

‘’ she sometimes made a compact with Lucifer, and wrote her name in his black-book with her blood and bound herself to torment Christians till Gods thrown down and we all must worship hell forever.’’–  Religion is very important at the time so people worshipping the devil would be something big for the people in Salem, which is why it was taken so serious.

Language/structure and effects:

Clipping: ‘’Why, she’s weepin’!’’ – Shows the way puritans spoke and were a form of slang.

Metaphor: ‘’ I may blush for my sin.’’- (Procter says this to Elizabeth)