Skip to main content

Explain how Miller uses symbolic actions and figurative language to communicate the state of the Proctors' relationship at the beginning of Act 2...

At the beginning of this act, the audience sees John Proctor go behind his wife's back to season her stew, and he then later tells her that t is "well-seasoned."  This action seems symbolic of John's lack of honesty with his wife, Elizabeth.  He doesn't want to hurt her feelings or cause any more negative feeling between them, and so he tells a white lie in order to give himself an opportunity to compliment her.  She catches him in a similarly small lie later in this scene, as he'd told her previously that he was never alone with Abigail when he went into town, and now he mentions that they were alone for a moment when Abigail told him that it wasn't witchcraft that caused Betty Parris's illness.  He likely told the small lie in order, again, to prevent more awkwardness and distrust between them, but when Elizabeth finds out that he lied, it makes him seem even less trustworthy.


Further, John uses a simile when he says that "It's warm as blood beneath the clods."  This could, perhaps, symbolize that despite Elizabeth and John's somewhat distant and chilly demeanor toward one another, they still very much love each other warmly beneath that surface coldness.  John also uses a metaphor when he describes their farm as a "continent when you go foot by foot droppin' seeds in it."  He thus emphasizes the tiresome work that he's been doing, much like the tiresome work he's been doing for the last seven months, trying to earn Elizabeth's forgiveness and trust again.  He can only do a little thing here, a little thing there, and it is taking forever.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is there a word/phrase for "unperformant"?

As a software engineer, I need to sometimes describe a piece of code as something that lacks performance or was not written with performance in mind. Example: This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. Based on my Google searches, this isn't a real word. What is the correct way to describe this? EDIT My usage of "performance" here is in regard to speed and efficiency. For example, the better the performance of code the faster the application runs. My question and example target the negative definition, which is in reference to preventing inefficient coding practices. Answer This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. In my opinion, reads more easily as: This coding style leads to unmaintainable and poorly performing code. The key to well-written documentation and reports lies in ease of understanding. Adding poorly understood words such as performant decreases that ease. In addressing the use of such a poorly ...
Post a Comment
Read more

A man has a garden measuring 84 meters by 56 meters. He divides it into the minimum number of square plots. What is the length of the square plots?

We wish to divide this man's garden into the minimum number of square plots possible. A square has all four sides with the same length.Our garden is a rectangle, so the answer is clearly not 1 square plot. If we choose the wrong length for our squares, we may end up with missing holes or we may not be able to fit our squares inside the garden. So we have 84 meters in one direction and 56 meters in the other direction. When we start dividing the garden in square plots, we are "filling" those lengths in their respective directions. At each direction, there must be an integer number of squares (otherwise, we get holes or we leave the garden), so that all the square plots fill up the garden nicely. Thus, our job here is to find the greatest common divisor of 84 and 56. For this, we prime factor both of them: `56 = 2*2*2*7` `84 = 2*2*3*7` We can see that the prime factors and multiplicities in common are `2*2*7 = 28` . This is the desired length of the square plots. If you wi...
Post a Comment
Read more

What warning does Chuchundra issue to Rikki?

Chuchundra, the sniveling, fearful muskrat who creeps around walls because he is too terrified to go into the center of a room, meets Rikki in the middle of the night. He insults Rikki by begging him not to kill him. He then insults him by suggesting that Nag might mistake Chuchundra for Rikki. He says, "Those who kill snakes get killed by snakes."  He issues this warning to Rikki not to help keep Rikki safe but as a way of explaining why Rikki's presence gives him, Chuchundra, more reason to fear.  Chuchundra starts to tell Rikki what Chua the rat told him--but breaks it off when he realizes he might be overheard by Nag. He says, "Nag is everywhere, Rikki-Tikki." Rikki threatens to bite Chuchundra to get him to talk. Even then, Chuchundra won't overtly reveal any information. But he does say, "Can't you hear, Rikki-Tikki?" This is enough of a clue for the clever mongoose. He listens carefully and can just make out the "faintest scratch-s...
Post a Comment
Read more