Mrs. Thompson’s The Crucible Act I Quiz Study Guide
- Review your character charts to understand and identify characters.
- Review the quotes from the play that you received on Friday. To make sure you know who said each quote and what the significance of the quotes, so that on the test you can write a solid analysis of different quotes you will be given from the play.
Below is a summary of Act I. It reviews the plot and the relationships of the characters that you will need to know for the test. Please also remember to review any notes you have taken during class discussions and also the General Notes document posted on Mrs. Thompson’s website.
Summary of Act I:
Act 1 takes place in the bedroom of Betty Parris. The plot revolves around the fact that Betty has a mysterious illness and everyone is trying to figure out why she is ill. Many characters come and go from the scene in an effort to solve the mystery. The reader finds out a lot of information about the relationships and the background of the residents of Salem.
Background: Prior to this incident, Reverend Parris found Abigail, Betty, Ruth, Mercy and Mary singing and dancing in the woods with Tituba who is a slave of Reverend Parris. He is worried that the girls were practicing witchcraft because he saw them dancing around a kettle and one of them appeared to be naked. He has sent for a minister from Beverly, Reverend Hale, to discover if Betty has been bewitched.
Mercy Lewis appears to tell Reverend Parris that Ruth Putnam is also sick. Thomas Putnam and his wife enter the scene. Ruth reveals that she sent the girls to Tituba to conjure the spirit of her dead babies. She is desperate to find out why she has lost 7 children in childbirth.
Thomas Putnam urges Reverend Parris to speak to the townspeople who have gathered downstairs to find out what is going on. Parris leaves and the girls speak alone. . We learn Abigail drank a charm to kill John Proctor’s wife, Goody Proctor. Abigail tells the girls that she has told her uncle that they danced and that they were not practicing witchcraft. She threatens the girls not to tell or she will make them pay.
John Proctor enters. The other girls leave when he orders them to go home. He is left alone with Abigail. We learn that Abigail used to work as a servant for Goody Proctor and that John had an affair with Abigail. This is the reason she was dismissed from Proctor’s household. Abigail still has feelings for John and would like the affair to continue. He swears it is over.
Parris and the Putnams return to the scene. Giles Corey and Rebecca Nurse also enter to find out what has happened to Betty. We learn Proctor and Corey plan to clear some land that Putnam swears belongs to him. Rebecca Nurse counsels the Reverend Parris not to look towards witchcraft as the cause of Betty’s illness. As the mother of many children, she believes that Betty is just having a “silly season”. She is critical of the fact that Ann Putnam sent the girls to conjure the spirit of her dead babies. We see that Ann is very jealous of Rebecca who has raised so many healthy children. Proctor, Corey and Putnam begin to argue over who owns the land that Proctor plans to clear. While they are arguing Reverend Hale arrives to investigate the situation.
Hale is the expert on witchcraft. He is out to rid Salem of evil if evil is present. Proctor and Rebecca Nurse leave the scene. They are not interested in watching Reverend Hale investigate the situation. Giles sticks around to ask Reverend Hale about whether it is sign of evil if his wife reads “strange” books.
Reverend Hale proceeds to interview Betty. When Anne Putnam confesses she sent the girls to Tituba, he demands to interview Tituba. Tituba denies that she practiced witchcraft until Reverend Parris threatens to beat her if she doesn’t tell the truth. To avoid being whipped she confesses to being a witch and starts accusing other people of being witches. Seeing that Tituba has escaped punishment by confessing to witchcraft, Abigail seizes the opportunity to confess to practicing witchcraft. She, too, starts naming names. They accuse Goody Osburn and Goody Good among others. Anne Putnam feels justified in her suspicions that there must have been a reason why her babies had died because Goody Osburn had been her midwife. Betty leaps ups and starts making accusations along with Abigail. The curtain falls as they call for the arrest of all those people who are being accused.
Quiz Format:
-Character identification matching
-Plot multiple choice
-Short answer (2)
-Quotation Analysis (3)