The Crucible

The newly settled land in the State of Massachusetts was largely wild and uncivilised and those of the state capital of Boston were hesitant to venture out into the wilderness for fear of the untamed savage presence. But with the edges of the American map being filled in by explorers and pioneers, a group of Puritans, a branch that had split from the Church of England, settled on the shores and made it their home. One of the small community villages along the water line, abutting the forest, was Salem. Its name today is synonymous with witchcraft but in the 1600s, this town was small and relatively peaceable – citizens made their living off the land and their Puritan lifestyle mandated a constant devotion to God in all they did. Their existence was theocratic, a system where the state’s legal system is based on religious law and the clergy often rule in place of a judicial band.

It’s important to note that Puritans lived a very simple life and this life was ruled by a set of strict guidelines; straying from those guidelines would incur punishment by the other townsfolk. Any singing, aside from hymns in church was banned, as was dancing. The women were forbidden to wear any frivolous decorations or do anything that might cause undue attention to themselves. They attended regular sermons in their village church and toiled every day in service, with the hope of redeeming their sinful ways and pleasing God.

Puritans called married women ‘Goodwife’ or ‘Goody’, followed by the surname of their husbands; so Elizabeth Proctor would be know as ‘Goody Proctor’ and so forth.

The Dressmaker

Dungatar is a fictitious town in rural Australia, small and isolated. As the town stores the great grain silos, neighbouring towns must often transport their grain to Dungatar to be stored and freighted. The people of Dungatar are aware that their behaviour is on show to the visitors from the surrounding townspeople and hence, make every attempt to be presentable and amiable. Dungatar is the focal point of the neighbouring towns (Winyerp and Itheca), and these neighbours are rivals in both football and life, and as it turns out, eventually on the stage as well.

Beneath the gaze of The Hill, where Molly and Tilly reside, the rest of the town is laid out with the houses gathered into the bend of the creek that ‘had always been low, choked with willows and cumbungi weed…the flow sluggish’ (Part 1). The Dunnage household overlooks the rest of the town and acts as a reminder to the townsfolk that they live among outcasts, while at the same time affording both Tilly and Molly the opportunity to observe and comment on the secular personalities existing in the town below. This vantage point, both literally and metaphorically, allows Tilly to see the townspeople for who they really are. The community buildings (the Post Office, Pratt’s Merchant Store, the Police Station, the Station Hotel and the Chemist) run along the spine of a thin gravel road that runs to the ‘green eye’ of the football oval.