Miiler's use of prose

[viveks02]

Why do you think Miller uses so much prose for the reader but not for the audience of the play? It seems to me, that he could include a narrator in the play production, but why didn't he?

[ajl]

Its possible that because it was actually a play, he didn't want to bore people to death- note that the prose is always in the form of "my opinion", so in a play that's third-person, the narrator would have been a bit overbearing.
Also, since the reader can't see the actors in the play, they wouldn't know what they looked like or how they dressed, so perhaps Miller uses prose to describe to the reader what the audience of the play could already see.
Another possibility is that the play version came out before the the actually book, so he added his own thoughts and the notes on the historical accuracy of the play after the play was already performed.

[jend02]

Also, i think that the when a production of the play is put on, its purpose is to tell a story and, most importantly, to entertain an audience who is paying to see the production. Although it is true that the prose added to description of characters that is unknown through reading the dialogue, I think that Miller's bigger purpose in the prose is to link the historical time period and tyrrany of consensus to the present in which he wrote the play. By providing prose to the reader, he is able to better portray his opinion and his purpose in writing the Crucible by creating opportunities for the reader to make more connections between Puritan society and today.

[daniellez07]

I definetly agree with Jen's interpretation of the usage of the prose. I feel as though Miller needed a way to connect with his audience and provide them with adequate historical information about Salem at the time. I think that the inclusion of Miller's statements such as "The salem tragedy [is]...developed from a pardox. It is a paradox in whose grip we still live, and there is no prospect yet that we will discover its resolution" (Miller 7) provide the reader with the knowledge that crisis escalating in Salem is still prominent in the life of the reader despite the time difference. This allows Miller to open up the minds of the readers to the crisis that will occur and its relation to their present and future world. His usage of the prose not only serves to provide his audience with a general context of the situation, but allows for the reader to develop a broad spectrum of thought that connects to aspects in The Crucible that connect to present-day society.

[ross]

Had Miller's prose been used in the play, it would have entirely altered the way audiences perceived it. In the text, the prose provides deeper insight into the characters and is used as a medium for analysis. The prose is certainly helpful in understanding the book with the dialogue subsequent to it. In fact, I think the prose in the book is entirely necessary because it’s descriptions of characters and settings make it easier to understand. However, to an audience member, this type of narration in the play would probably be uncalled for with backdrops and visual aids on a stage. The prose would be distracting in that it would break the third wall with the audience and take away from the continuity of the dialogue. Also, the audiences at these plays were culturally knowledgeable; a line such as: “When a new farmhouse was built, friends assembled to ‘raise the room,’ and there would be special foods cooked…” (Miller 4) would not do much for that typical audience. In addition, an audience would probably not want a narrator to control their interpretation of the play, whereas a reader may deem it useful.

[jrodrigues]

As we discussed in class, a play expresses one interpretation of a story. I think Miller didn't include the prose or a narrator in the real play so the audience could make their own interpretation of the meaning of the plot. It may be more helpful for a reader to know what Miller's intentions were, to see the same interpretatio he inded for when writing. The prose gives the reader more background information to better see Miller's style and intentions. If a narrator said this in the play, it would take something away from the audience in that they would be told the meaning behind the events instead of being able to challenge their brains to figure out a meaning behind these absurd events.