The reign of terror that swept Salem Village in 1692 is still the most celebrated of all witch hunts. It was a tragedy of individuals, which underlined as sharply as has any event in history the power of self-righteousness, fantasy & fear to turn decent people into fanatical persecutors. The accused were diverse personalities: a well-respected grandmother & an honest, skeptical farmer, as well as a pipe-smoking female tramp. One by one they were sent to the gallows by a pack of unbalanced young girls & a stiff-necked little Puritan community inflamed by the girls' testimony.
Born in the state that once countenanced these atrocities, Marion L. Starkey 1st published her deeply moving The Devil in Massachusetts in 1949. An authentic historical narrative, it takes its dialog from actual trial records but applies modern psychiatric knowledge to the witchcraft hysteria. At the same time the author's unerring sense of drama succeeds in creating the pity & terror so necessary to an understanding of the human capacity for evil & suffering.