preview

A Jury Of Her Peers Summary

Decent Essays

Murder is one of the most vile, inhuman crimes a person can commit. “A Municipal Report” by O. Henry and “A Jury of Her Peers” by Susan Glaspell both involve a vindictive murder of an abusive husband and the hiding of incriminating evidence, however, the two stories also differ in their purposes. Henry takes the reader through an implausible series of events, taking the reader away from reality, while Glaspell illustrates the vital individual decisions as well as the morality that goes with murder, domestic violence, and feminism. “A Municipal Report” does not do more than entertain the reader, and is commercial fiction, while “A Jury of Her Peers” reveals truths about human life, and is literary fiction. There are significant differences …show more content…

Henry also seeks to entertain the reader by offering contemporary references for the time period and presenting classics of literature such as Shakespeare’s works to engage his audience. He provides suspense and mystery that completely miss our emotions, by the end of the story the reader has not been connected to characters and they can only feel what they think they should feel because of the theme. In “A Jury of Her Peers” the main theme concerns morality and justice and is expressed through the idea of feminism. The power of decisions lies in the hands of the women rather than the typical male. At the time this was published, in 1917, the feminist element would have had few precedents. Women were strictly confined to their roles so controversy over this standard would have been shocking. Throughout the story there is a constant separation of the men and women such as gender roles. The attorney talks about how the kitchen is the women’s domain while adding “a little laugh for the insignificance of kitchen things” (394) and gives some pots and pans a “disdainful push on the foot” (396). Minnie Foster, Mrs. Hale, Mrs. Peters, and women in general, are consistently being degraded and limited to their gender roles of that time. The reader is meant to feel sympathetic towards Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters from the very beginning as victims of men’s sexism. The deeper meaning Glaspell is trying to communicate goes straight to the reader’s emotions and senses due to the plights these female characters go

Get Access