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Analysis for trifles
Analysis for trifles
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A wise man once said, “marriage can change a person, for better or for worse”, a phenomenon that is portrayed by Susan G. Glaspell’s one-act play Trifles. The play ponders the murder investigations of Mr. Wright, a man who was found dead, strangled by a rope. The sheriff and county attorney begin the investigation, as the men quickly try to find evidence to prove that Mrs. Wright killed her husband. On the other hand, the ladies, Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peterson begin wondering around the murder scene, as they try to find items to bring back to Mrs. Wright who’s in custody, only to find disturbing evidence that would make Mrs. Wright’s motive very clear. Unique to this one-act play is Glaspell’s use of the literal device exposition to develop the …show more content…
Wright is also another important character who through exposition the audience can generate a strong comprehension of her. Specifically, through the conversation between Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale, the audience is able to understand and contrast Minnie as a person before and during her marriage with John Wright. It is indisputable that Minnie was a different person before she married John Wright, as Mrs. Hale tells Mrs. Peters “I wish you’d seen Minnie Foster when she wore a white dress with blue ribbons and stood up there in the choir and sang” (125). Mrs. Halle also states “I heard she used to wear pretty clothes and be lively, when she was Minnie Foster, one of the town girls singing in the choir” (120). Before Minnie Foster married John Wright she was a social and happy women who participated in the choir and wore beautiful clothes. After getting married to John Wright her life became very lonely and isolated. Her isolation is very evident, as Mrs. Hale says “I think maybe that’s why she kept so much to herself. She didn’t even belong to the Ladies’ Aid” (120). Furthermore, in the article “In the Presence of a Domestic Drama: Susan Glaspell’s Debt to Joseph Conrad’s THE SECERT AGENT”, David Mulry states, “[t]he Wright household is cold, empty, and quiet” (294). This information is revealed to the audience through exposition during the introduction of the play, as the prologue describes the scene as a “gloomy kitchen, and left without having been put in order-the walls covered with a faded wallpaper” (115). Metaphorically, the description of the household portrays the marriage of Mrs. Wright, as her marriage was depressing and distant. Further, through the dialogue between the ladies, Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters, we learn that Minnie showed symptoms of anxiety and nervousness, as the ladies discover a quilt that is “so nice and even” (121). However, a part of the sewing is “all over the place” (121), which demonstrates anxious and nervous behaviour. Mrs. Hale
I. Article Summary: Suzy Clarkson Holstein's article, “Silent Justice in a Different Key: Glaspell's 'Trifles'” evaluates the play Trifles and how the difference between the men in the play mirror how a woman's perspective is very different from a man's. Trifles is about two women, Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale, who show up at a house with their husbands and the county attorney to investigate a murder. The entire time the men are looking for evidence to implicate the accused wife, Minnie Wright, of killing her husband. Meanwhile, Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale are there to gather up some items to bring Minnie Wright in jail. While doing so, the women uncover evidence that would prove the wife is culpable but decide to hide it from the men in the last moments of the play. Trifles is evaluated on how the women are able to come up with the evidence unlike the men because they didn't approach it like a crime scene but rather a home, “By contrast, the women arrive at a home. Although neither they or the men realize it, they too are conducting an investigation” (Holstein 283). Holstein also notes they are able to find evidence because they use their own life experiences to relate to the accused murderer, Minnie Wright as shown here; “But the women do not simply remember and sympathize with Minnie. They identify with her, quite literally” (285). Holstein finishes the article by noting the women decide to hide the evidence because of the solidarity they feel towards Minnie Wright; “From Mrs. Hale's perspective, people are linked together through fragile, sometimes imperceptible strands. The tiny trifles of life –a neighbor's visit, a bird's song, the sewing of a quilt –have profound reverberations” (287).
Trifles” is a play written in 1916 by Susan Glaspell. The play’s audience consists of young adults to those in their late 50’s. Mrs. Glaspell takes a serious matter of domestic violence and uses her platform as an author to raise awareness about the issue. In the play “Trifles” a neighbor went to the home of Mr. and Mrs. Wright only to find Mr. Wright dead in his bed. He had been strangled to death by a rope. The neighbor questioned Mrs. Wright about the matter and her response was odd and suspicious. Mrs. Wright was taken to jail while the home is being investigated for further evidence. Mrs. Glaspell’s play “Trifles” effectively achieves the goal in raising awareness on domestic violence by the evidence of the crime and through pathos.
The Sheriff, Attorney, and neighbour Mr. Hale look for evidence while the women Mrs. Peters and Hale are left to their own devices in the kitchen. Condescendingly, the men mock the women’s concerns over Mrs. Wright’s stored preserves, its stated: “Well, women are used to worrying over trifles.” (Hale, act 1) It’s inferred that women- who care only of trifles, something of little or no importance, must be trifles themselves. Ironically, these said trifles: the quilt, preserves, a little bird- which will be discussed later, are what solves this mystery. A major concern expressed by all the characters is motive; why would Mrs. Wright kill her husband? While discussing the marriage and disposition of the victim, its stated: “Yes--good; he didn't drink, and kept his word as well as most, I guess, and paid his debts. But he was a hard man, Mrs. Peters. Just to pass the time of day with him. (Shivers.) Like a raw wind that gets to the bone.” (Mrs. Hale, act 1) Abuses, which have been hinted at all throughout the play are finally spoken of in these lines. Audiences find, that Mrs. Wright- “real sweet and pretty, but kind of timid” - would murder her
Minnie Foster was once described as the belle of the ball. To look at her tonight for the first time you could see why. She carried herself with both an air of confidence and modesty at the same time. Her small eyes dominated her face. They did not look directly at you anymore though. Still, they seemed all knowing and experienced as if they were able to see and know secrets about you that you wish no one knew. Her slender peaked nose was no match for the full lips she had, lips that never uttered a sound and which have become as pale as her knuckles. Her lips were pierced shut protecting the thoughts in her head from falling out one by one to the hard flooring.
Mrs. Wright, Mrs. Hale, and Mrs. Peters, are all in marriages where their husbands dominate their lives. Mrs. Wright has been cut off from all contact with the outside world by her husband. She never has company, doesn’t have any children, and isn’t allowed a phone. She spends her days making bread and preserves and tending to the household chores. She is there to take care of her husbands every whim. Mrs. Hales states, “I heard she used to wear pretty clothes and be lively, when she was Minnie Foster, one of the town girls singing in the choir” (Glaspell). This quote is important because it shows that Mrs. Wright used to be her own person prior to being married. Whenever Mrs. Hale talks about Mrs. Wright in the play, she always refers to her as Minnie Foster. This is a way of giving her back a little piece her identity. The other men characters in the play also show their dominance by the way they discount women’s opinions. Mr. Hale states, “Well, women are used to worrying over trifles” (Glaspell). By this he means, women spend their time worrying over small things that are not important. At this point in Minnie’s marriage, this was all she had to worry about. Her life was reduced to performing menial tasks that she clung to because everything else had been taken away from
In the play Trifles, written by Susan Glaspell, a small number of people are at the Wright house trying to figure out why and how Mr. Wright was murdered. Mrs. Wright is already the suspect, and all that is needed for the case is evidence for a motive. The jury needs something to show anger or sudden feeling so that they can convict her for murder. The men, Mr. Henderson, Mr. Peters, and Mr. Hale are there to find the evidence. The women, Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale, are there to pick up a select few items for Mrs. Wright. While the men are going about business and looking for evidence to build a case against Mrs. Wright, the women are looking over what Mrs. Wright left behind and intuitively trying to understand what happened. They are also trying to fathom why Mrs. Wright would be compelled to perform such an act of violence. As the story goes on, it constructs each of the characters in slightly different means. Susan Glaspell presents Mr. Wright and Mrs. Hale as having contrasting and comparable characteristics. While Mrs. Hale and Mr. Wright differ in terms of emotions, they are similar in their cleanliness and are well respected by others.
The short one-act play Trifles by Susan Glaspell, was years ahead of its time. Its time was 1916 but the subject matter is timeless. The aspect of this play that most caught my interest was the contrast between the men and women characters. This is a play written in the early 1900s but transcends time periods and cultures. This play has many strengths and few weaknesses, but helps to provide a very accurate portrait of early American women and the issues they dealt with in everyday comings and goings.
In Susan Glaspell’s play Trifles Mr. Wright’s murder is never solved because the two women in the story unite against of the arrogance of men to hide evidence that would prove Mrs. Wright as the murderer. The play Trifles is about the death of farmer Mr. Wright and how the town sheriff and attorney try to find evidence that his wife Mrs. Wright killed him. As the play progresses the men’s wives who had come along were discovering important pieces of evidence that prove the men’s theory but chose to hide from them to illustrate the point that their ideas should have been valued and not something to be trifled. The very irony of the play comes from its title trifles and is defined as something that isn’t very important or has no relevance to the situation that it is presented to. In this play the irony of the title comes from the fact that the men find the women’s opinions on the case trifling even though the women solve the crime which ends up being the downfall of the men as they would have been able to prosecute Mrs. Wright if they had listened which made the women’s opinions not trifling. Glaspell was born in an age where women were still considered the property of men and they had no real value in society in the eyes of men except for procreation and motherhood. This attitude towards women was what inspired Glaspell to write the play Trifles and to illustrate the point that women’s attitudes should be just as valued as men’s and to let women have a sense of fulfillment in life and break the shackles that were holding them only as obedient housewives. Trifles was also inspired by a real murder trial that Glaspell had been covering when she was a reporter in the year 1900. Glaspell is a major symbol of the feminist movement of l...
In Trifles, the play takes place at an abandon house at a farm where John Wright and his wife, Minnie Wright lived. John was killed with a rope around his neck while his wife was asleep. The neighbor, county attorney and sheriff came to the crime scene for investigation. Along with them came their wives, Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters; they were told to grab some belongings for Mrs. Wright that she may need while she’s in custody. Once they all entered the home the men dismissed the kitchen finding it as unimportant. The three men focused more on legal regulations of the law. The play was mostly revolved around the women, discovering the motive through “trifles” and other symbolic things that had significance to Minnie’s guilt. When Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters understood the reason behind the murdering they hid the evidence from their husbands, and kept quiet. Many readers would visualize this play as a feminist point of view due to women’s bonding in discovering Minnie’s oppressive life after marriage. However Glaspell, provokes two ethical paradigms that have different perspectives of justice. Glaspell uses symbolism to characterize women’s method in a subjective way, by empowering themselves through silence, memories of her and their own lives as well as having empathy about her sit...
Susan Glaspell's play, "Trifles", attempts to define one of the main behavioral differences between man and woman. For most of the story, the two genders are not only geographically separated, but also separated in thought processes and motive, so that the reader might readily make comparisons between the two genders. Glaspell not only verbally acknowledges this behavioral difference in the play, but also demonstrates it through the characters' actions and the turns of the plot. The timid and overlooked women who appear in the beginning of the play eventually become the delicate detectives who, discounted by the men, discover all of the clues that display a female to be the disillusioned murderer of her (not so dearly) departed husband. Meanwhile, the men in the play not only arrogantly overlook the "trifling" clues that the women find that point to the murderer, but also underestimate the murderer herself. "These were trifles to the men but in reality they told the story and only the women could see that (Erin Williams)". The women seem to be the insightful unsung heroes while the men remain outwardly in charge, but sadly ignorant.
The play entitled “Trifles,” by Susan Glaspell, begins as a murder mystery that turns into a drama as the story unfolds. The story is focused on the investigation of a murder that took place in a farm house. The investigators, who are all men, are in the farm house looking for forensic evidence to help them solve the murder. The wives of two of the investigators are there to retrieve personal items for the wife of the victim. Mrs. Wright, who is the wife of the victim, is in jail as the primary suspect of her husband’s murder. When the story begins, all the characters are in the kitchen engaging in small talk. One of the investigators is criticizing the state of the kitchen by complaining that it is dirty and unorganized. The women, who are also house wives, empathize with Mrs. Wright and defend her kitchen by reminding the investigator that house work on a farm is not easy. Throughout the story, the men consistently make stereotypical statements against the women and Mrs. Wright. This paper will analyze male dominance and the effect it had on the female characters. More specifically it will examine how the female characters were forced to develop an intimate bond and how they formed an unspoken form of communication to combat the patriarchy displayed by the male characters.
In the play Trifles, Susan Glaspell brings together three women through a crime investigation in the late nineteenth century. Glaspell uses symbolism, contrast of sexes, and well-constructed characters to show that justice for all is equally important to finding the truth. Perhaps the most prevalent literary device in the Trifles is the rich symbolism. Each of the women in the play are equally important, but come together to become more powerful. Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters directly bond, while Mrs. Wright indirectly contributes from jail by leaving them small clues.
Throughout “Trifles” by Susan Glaspell, the setting, stage set, societal norms, and symbolism within the play all contribute to our understanding of the wife’s central conflict. With the guilt of killing her husband, Mrs. Wright develops an internal conflict within herself. This conflict is exacerbated throughout the play due to these factors.
Women have lived for generations being treated as nothing more than simple-minded creatures who were able to do little more than take care of their husbands and maintain a home, but that idea is dangerous. The years of abusing women by withholding their rights, belittling them, and keeping them in the home was sometimes detrimental to not only the female sex, but to the males sex as well. Susan Glaspell is the author of the short play “Trifle” , in which Mrs. Wright, the housewife of a local farmer, is being investigated for the murder of her husband. As a local county attorney, sheriff, and male neighbor scour the house for motive and proof that Mrs. Wright killed her husband, the men spend much of their time criticizing the housekeeping skills of Mrs. Wright and belittling every woman in the play for their simplicity. Their assumptions about the female sex, prevents them from seeing the crime scene for what it really was. Meanwhile, Mrs. Peters, the sheriff’s wife, and Mrs. Hale, the neighbor man’s wife, are able to relate in many ways to the loneliness and loss of self that Mrs. Wright felt while spending her days alone tending to her home and husband.
Susan Glaspell’s Trifles (1916), is a play that accounts for imprisonment and loneliness of women in a patriarchal society. The plot has several instances where women issues are perceived to be mere trifles by their male counterparts. The title is of significant importance in supporting the main theme of the story and developing the plot that leads to the evidence of the mysterious murder. Trifles can be defined as things of less importance; in this story dramatic, verbal and situational irony is used to show how the insignificant trifles lead to a great deal of truth in a crime scene investigation. The title of the story “Trifles” is used ironically to shape the unexpected evidence discovered by women in