Topic 2: Young Goodman Brown

Literary critic Taylor Stoehr writes, "Hawthorne seems to throw the blame on his characters, while at the same time he gives them no possible means of saving themselves." Explain whether or not you agree with this statement as it applies to the characters in "Young Goodman Brown." Support your response with specific details from the text.

This time, post your response as a comment instead of a new post. You can respond to each other, too

ELIZABETH TO JOHN

Not long ago your voice boomed like the thunder every time i asked you a question

Not long ago your voice held the softness of a plow cushing my heart with your lies.

Not long ago your voice was my very undoing.

Not long ago your voice was distant as the sun is from the place I stand.

Not long ago your voice was the thing i feared.

Not long ago your voice stabbed me like the needles and pins of a voodoo doll.

Not long ago...

Now your voice holds the feeling of deciet and lies.

Now your voice holds the sorrow of losing me.

Now your voice wants to make peace with mine like the earth does the moon.

Now you voice whispers promises that i know you can't keep.

Now your voice dies when it hears mine

John to Abigailllllllllllllllllllllllll

Your voice sounds like a dagger
Which glints in the firelight as it's being unsheathed
It's tip as lethal as it is exposed

Your voice sounds like a harlot
wandering through the innermost chasms of my mind
scantily clad, with an inferno in your eyes

I am devolving now, regretting you
and when this is over- you will speak no more

Your voice is a drug
demolishing our lives
cracking our voices like some piteous creature

Your voice is an instrument of God
The truest crucible
To return to obliivion

Your voice is soft now, darling
speak low, you are fading like a dream
My best scene is disposing you
as a wave washes over the sand
The evidence is gone now
The world is one

Your Voice, John to Abigail

Your voice is like a constant buzzing in my ears.
Your voice, a disturbing cry next to my being.
Always, always I can hear your voice.
Your voice, and the imminent reminder of what I did,
And what I should never have done.
Seeing you is to be reminded of the unforgivable sin I committed.
Your voice, a haunting spirit in my head.
Why can I not escape you Abigail?
Because it is you, not I who has become the imminent threat.
Your voice, the howling repeat of the impending doom,
And the special pit that awaits me in Hell.
I hate you Abigail Williams.
Your voice must now leave my head,
For I will not be subdued...

Your Voice, John to Abigail

Your voice sounds like the nonstop ranting of a never satisfied woman.
The hellish screams of a person being murdered slowly.
It's like the painful screams a woman's cries during childbirth,
And I am the woman just wanting the pain to end but have no choice in the matter.
Your voice feels like someone attached thousands of hooks onto my brain,
and they just keep pulling down on these hooks digging them deeper and deeper.
It feels like being strapped to a chair not being able to move or speak
While you banter on with your stories of lies painfully eat away at my flesh.
Your voice leaves me feeling defeated with irritation and distress.
Your voice tastes like month old spoiled milk.
Just the slightest drop on the toungue makes me gag and shutter.
Even the hungriest bum on the street would not drink your words.
Your voice looks like the most hideious beast the mind could fathom.
Just one look leaves the eyes seared and scared.
Even the bacterica growing on puss cannot bare to be in your presense.
You smell like a pit of rotting human bodies.
Your rancidness is unbarable and wafts through to air
Suffocating anyone in a mile wide radius.
You linger around wanting the be accepted but I will never love you!

Your Voice, From John to Abigail

Your voice is like the sharpest ice shard,
During the coldest of the winter days,
Dropping from a tree branch,
Killing the couple squirrels underneath you.

Your voice is like the sting of a scorpion,
That will not kill the victim;
It will torture the victim's conscious,
Knowing that he has let the weakest of the weak,
Defeat him at last.

Your voice is like many things.
It is like the fire of Hell,
The luring of the sweetest honey,
The temptation of greed,
And, at last, the sound of the fallen.

A Voice, Elizabeth to Abigail, Evan Syverson

Your voice sounds like a gunshot
echoing through the barrel
Like a crash of thunder
in the vastness of night
Like an avalanche
on the most peaceful mountain
where no one expected it
Like a knife in the back
Like the knife through my heart
Like an aftershock
feeding off of the chaos
Like the devil
feeding off of the weak.

Your Voice

Your voice sounds like the crackle of fire,

When a log splits in half and moves the embers around,

Spreading itself farther and becoming stronger.

Your voice sounds like the crunching leaves of the nearby field,

Feeding the inferno as it licks higher towards Heaven,

Consuming more and more until it seems uncontrollable.

Your voice sounds like the wooden foundations of houses,

When they crack and turn to ash,

Collapsing while smoke fills the rooms they once framed.

But my voice is like the subtle hiss of water,

When it throws itself on top of the flames.

My voice stops the fire,

And all of the destruction it has intended to create.

Your voice

Your voice is like two glass cups scratching together
like a whining baby that never quites
like styrofoam pieces rubbing together
like a high pitched bark of a dog
when it is starving for food

You voice reminds me that we will never see eye to eye
because you are nothing more then a child
it reminds me that you are a liar
because i can hear your voice crack on every fib
and because the notes you create do not flow

Your voice is like gravel scratching underneath a car
like the wind when it threatens to storm
like ice cubes when they hit the ground in clumps
your voice is a constant reminder to me
i never want to hear it again

Your Voice

Persona: Abigail Williams
Subject: John Proctor

Your voice is like a pair of singing lovebirds
caring and affectionate
like flowers in full bloom
like two rainbows after a rainstorm
a song that leads the faithful to God
a light in the eternal dark
like an old pair of shoes
comforting through familiarity
Your voice reminds me of the good on this world
rare and unapparent
of how I can find the strength to live through each day
of why I can believe in the human heart
a good deed
an act of kindness
never to fail or falter

Your Voice

Persona- Elizabeth to John


Your voice is bitter anger,
You must know I've found out the truth.
Your voice is like poison,
Sweet to the taste, slowly killing.
Your voice is the wind,
It whispers around and right through me, telling it's lies.
Your voice is a clever fox,
Calmly coaxing it's prey; full of lies.
Your voice is nails scratching against the pavement,
It's piercing drone running through my ears.
Your voice is a tennis ball flying towards the window,
In one moment, what was once whole is now broken into a million pieces.
Your voice is pain and sorrow,
Begging my forgiveness.
It is repulsing.
Your voice is an incessant buzz,
It has been heard before, and is now tuned out.
Your voice, your voice,
Reminds me of a soapy bubble,
Filled with distant memories,
You can never get back.
In an instant, it disappears,
and as I look back on your lies, I can't forgive or forget.

Your voice is like ice to my blood,
Once an object of lust, now a target of my despise
Your voice tugs on the loose thread of my marriage,
threatening to unravel all i hold dear,
Your voice paints pictures of yesterday,
yet I must live in today,
and in forever with my Elizabeth,
Your voice has been both the fire which burns in my heart,
and also the fire which has set fire to my once honorable, and honest home,
Your voice commands the hearts of good men,
to do unnatural things,
it is as deceitful, as it is dangerous,
Your voice is beatiful,
yet insidious,
always beguiling,
Your voice to most would sound faultless,
yet to my ears it is macabre,
A slow dance of death
Your voice has wronged me,
yet more so it has wronged those I love,
for that it is foul,
Your words are those of a harlot,
you have no sway over me.

My Voice

My voice controls you, like a leash around your neck
My words are like a siren's song, directing your ship into the rocks
My voice is a brilliant light, and you are an obedient moth
My voice is a hall of mirrors; each word I say rebounds upon another
My voice is fluid and strong and loud, like a colossal waterfall
My watery words crush you, like a tiny helpless goldfish
My voice is like a box, enclosing and surrounding you
My words kill all opposition, like bug spray on a fly
My cry reaches to the heavens, it cannot be restricted
My words will wrap around your throat and drag you from the truth
My voice will not be ignored, it amplifies with each passing day
My words will triumph over you, like a brick dropped on an ant

Your Voice

Persona: John Proctor to Abigail

You voice struck my heart with Cupid's arrow,
and liberated me from my lethargy.
Your voice used to to remind me of heavenly utopia,
my prior innocence, until I stole yours.
You voice is now the mold from bread,
displeasing, ugly, and sickening.
Your voice can shatter whole armies,
thundering from miles away.
Your voice cries out for the approval of the devil,
a man of eternal damnation.
Your voice is the disease that can never be cured,
a sickness that only grows until it has collided with every soul.
Your voice is a bug that creeps under my skin,
a parasite that'll continue to feed from my flesh.
Your voice has laid deceit on my bed and over my house,
an unwanted presence haunting every corner.
Your voice are the pair of scissors that cut Elizabeth and I in two,
but it'll be my voice responsible for the exposure of your lies.

Your voice...Elizabeth to Abigail

Your voice is like nails to a chalkboard
like screeching tires on a newly paved street.
like the buzz of a mosquito that will not go away
no matter how hard you try, it keeps coming back.
it is in my husband, every time I look at him I can hear your disgusting voice.
it is in every liar, every manipulator, every sinner.
your voice has killed innocent people.
it is shameful.
it is like the forbidden words that should never be spoken
and it is the corruption in everyone's thoughts.
your voice is like poison to anything around you
it seeps out slowly, gradually killing any pureness that may be around.
it is sickening.
it is evil, it is death, is it hatred.
you never saw the devil, and you were never controlled by him,
he would not need to do this, because your voice is already evil enough
if anything, your voice makes the devil jealous.
every time you speak, your voice is like a dagger to my heart.
Your voice...

--Colleen

Your Voice...

Persona: Mary Warren describing Abigail

Your voice is my master, and it is commander to all.
I hear it day and night as it slowly consumes my soul.
I will always obey it, great leader, for fear of your wrath.

Your voice, dear Abigail, sends chills down my back.
One word out of your lips opens up the gates of Heaven,
and the fiery doors of Hell will stand open with gaping mouths.

Your voice is the Devil, self-centered in all perspectives.
It does not care about anyone but its own being,
ignorant of the harm it causes and the pain it brings.

Your voice has put a stake through my chest,
for it has framed my image in the village as unstable.
It used me to save itself from the humility it deserved,
and Abigail, you will regret it! I ASSURE YOU, YOU WILL ...

Oh my fearless Abigail, your voice is my comfort.
In times of trouble and accusations, it s there to soothe me,
as a mother whispers in the ears of her baby.

My forgiving Abigail, your voice is my protection,
and it cradles my head in the depths of your bosom.
Forgive my voice, my friend Abigail, for it has done wrong.
Speak to me, oh listen to me, for my voice is now yours.

Your Voice

persona: Elizabeth Proctor describing Abigail Williams


Your voice sounds like the thunders of hell
Screaming the cries of the eternally persecuted
Clawing for forsake attention

Your voice sounds like a thousand archangels
Proclaiming the hymns of death and Lucifer
Forbidden from the grace of God

Your voice sounds like the Alpha of the Omega
Extinguishing the only grandeur left of the terrene
Engraving only despair and gloom

Your voice is like the rotting inanimate
Giving rise to a cemetary inside a commune
Slaughtering it gravestone by gravestone

Your voice comes from the gaping mouth of the Abaddon
An aura crimson with abhorrence
Passing through and leaving naught but ash

Your voice is forsaken from my ears
Your voice is forsaken from the ears of John

And your voice is forsaken from the ears of God


-Justin Park

Your voice makes me sick.....

Persona John Proctor
Directed to Abigail

Your voice sounds like a fatal poison consuming my body
Taking control of my mind and stripping me of my voice
Twisting my organs in unfamiliar ways to command the greatest pain

Your voice sounds like a flood without warning destroying everything innocent in its path
Watching each face a death of terror, torture, and confusion
Not a soul can demolish the control you hold in your deceitful hands

Your voice sounds like a sword piercing my heart and the heart of my wife
Your beauty hides your decietful lies from the townspeople like the shield of a mightly warrior
Behind the shield you stand true, a woman of no worth and no importance to me.

Your voice has opened the fierce gates of the underworld
After a simple glance at our heart, minds, and souls we will never be the same
Take your controlling and overbearing being out of here forever for we cannot bear to face more damage than you have caused.

Your voice makes me sick.

Your Voice

Persona: Elizabeth describing John:

Your voice sounds like deceit
Secrets and lies that keep you away
The burden you brought into this marriage
The dagger you stabbed into my heart

Your voice sounds like regret
A mistake that lives and burns within you each and everyday
A mistake that meant more than I can ever say

Your voice sounds like sorrow
That asks for forgiveness
Forgiveness that will take time to achieve

Your voice creates fire
That burns a hole into our marriage
But your voice also creates water
Which one day, will wash away your deceit

--Reena Patel

Your Voice

Persona: John Proctor
To Abigail


Your voice makes heart throb
with an unexplainable pain
Your voice makes me think of all the things
That I now regret.
Your voice sends a shiver up my spine
As I think of my dear wife.
Your voice is like a mask full of deceit
As your sweet innocent cries try to lure back me in.
Your voice is like knives being thrown into my back
As I feel your pain, my wife’s, and my own.
Your voice gives me the torture
that you now give your neighbors.
Your voice is like Lucifer's,
You are becoming him from your own lies.
Your voice reminds me of the reasons why I left.

Your Voice

Persona: Elizabeth describing Abigail

Your voice sounds like the beginning of the end,
Like a growling hound that has nothing to lose
Like a cat preparing to pounce on its prey
Like the mouse content to scurry away

The sound of your voice is the addiction to evil.
Letting loose the most savage, foul whims of the depths of human capability,
And making them seem as righteous as God.

Your voice is like the stench of burning flesh
And the laughter of the executioner.
Your voice creeps hatefully to every place that it can leave in ruin,
Into my house
Into my marriage
Into the town’s justice system
And it leaves a trail of ash and corruption wherever it goes.

Your voice sounds like a predator of the night
Preying on all that is real and true
A dictator leading the forces of chaos and depravity

Your voice is a lightning bolt said to be the messenger of God,
That sets fire to the church and to religion as we know it,
And that causes God’s word to burn away in the hysteria.

Your voice is an arsonist,
Reveling in its power to release chaos and destruction
And sneaking away, leaving everything to burn in your hell.

-Robert Kramer

"Your Voice" Poem

Persona- Abagail
Directed to John Proctor

Your voice sounds like vengeance in the making, shattering Puritan principles.
Your voice sounds like uncompromising justice, hellbent on my destruction.
Your voice sounds like the bane of my life, the one thing that can undermine me.
Your voice sounds like a storm of fury, brewing in jet black clouds above my head.
Your voice sounds like a tidal wave of resentment, a flood of pure loathing.
Your voice sounds like a tangible thorn in my side, crippling my deceit.
Your voice sounds like the end of me
.Your voice is my undoing.

Topic 1: Sweet Like a Crow

This exercise is inspired by Michael Ondaatje's list poem, "Sweet Like a Crow." Notice that the entire poem is prefaced with "Your voice sounds like..." Your task is to take the persona of John Proctor and, using Abigail Williams as your subject, write a parody of this poem. Your poem doesn't need to be as long as Ondaatje's is; try for a minimum of 12 lines. As the voice of John Proctor you could choose to describe Abigail's voice or you could choose another aspect of her "charming" personality. Just like Ondaatje, avoid cliche. Write lines that are clever and original. **If you'd rather choose two different Crucible characters, that's fine too. Just tell us your 'subjects' before you begin. Have fun!

Your voice sounds like a scorpion being pushed
through a glass tube
like someone has just trod on a peacock
like wind howling in a coconutlike a rusty bible, like someone pulling barbed wire
across a stone courtyard, like a pig drowning,
a vattacka being fried
a bone shaking hands
a frog singing at Carnegie Hall.
Like a crow swimming in milk,
like a nose being hit by a mango
like the crowd at the Royal-Thornian match,
a womb full of twins, a pariah dogwith a magpie in its mouth
like the midnight jet from Casablancalike Air Pakistan curry,
a typewriter on fire,
like a spirit in the gaswhich cooks your dinner,
like a hundredpappadans being crunched, like someone
uselessly trying to light 3 Roses matches in a dark room,
the clicking sound of a reef when you put your head into the sea,
a dolphin reciting epic poetry to a sleepy audience,
the sound of a fan when someone throws brinjals at it,
like pineapples being sliced in the Pettah market
like betel juice hitting a butterfly in mid-air
like a whole village running naked onto the street
and tearing their sarongs, like an angry family
pushing a jeep out of the mud, like dirt on the needle,
like 8 sharks being carried on the back of a bicycle
like 3 old ladies locked in the lavatory
like the sound I heard when having an afternoon sleep
and someone walked through my room in ankle bracelets.

--Michael Ondaatje