Irony In Susan Glaspell's Trifles

    As a strong feminist, Susan Glaspell wrote “Trifles” and then translated it to a story called “A Jury of Her Peers.”  These works express Glaspell’s view of the way women were treated at the turn of the century.  Even though Glaspell is an acclaimed feminist, her story does not contain the traditional feminist views of equal rights for both sexes.

In a world where showing a bit too much shoulder was forbidden, came Susan Glaspell. Glaspell was an American playwright, born in the cruel times of oppression. This influenced women’s opinions on certain subjects which caused them to be silenced by fear of rejection from society. “A Jury of Her Peers” was based on an era where women felt as though it was unreasonable to speak up if they felt it was not absolutely dire. Harboring these pent up feelings could cause a person to act antagonistic. Minnie Wright was an example of this. She killed her husband and was subjected to the judgement of her peers. As the group investigated Mr. Wright’s death, there were two stories unraveling. The in depth explanation that the women figured out and the simplistic version the men had seemed to pick up (Glaspell). People would benefit from reading this story to begin to understand the struggle of what this and other women had gone through. Penn Manor American Literature students would benefit from having Susan Glaspell’s story “A Jury of Her Peers” in their curriculum because of how she expressed feminism through her writing at a time when it was new and discouraged; her ability to emphasize the themes with her settings and characters; and her literature that follows a protagonist that navigates through a sexist world.

In today's society, we generally view upon everyone as equal beings who deserve equal rights. At the turn of the 20th century, this particular view didn?t exist. Men clearly dominated almost every aspect of life and women were often left with little importance. The Wright?s embody this view of roles in Susan Glaspell?s play Trifles. Mrs. Wright was a typical woman who suffered the mental abuse from her husband and was caged from life. In Trifles, a mixture of symbolism of oppression illustrates Mrs. Minnie Wright?s motives to kill her husband and to escape from imprisonment.

The play “Trifles” by Susan Glaspell is type of murder mystery that takes place in the early 1900’s. The play begins when the sheriff Mr. Peters and county attorney Mr. Henderson come to attempt to piece together what had happen on the day that Mr. Wright was murder. While investigating the seen of the murder, they are accompanied by the Mr. Hale, Mrs. Hale and Mr. Peters. Mr. Hale had told that Mrs. Wright was acting strange when he found her in the kitchen. After taking information from Mr. Hale, the men leave the women in the kitchen and go upstairs at seen of the murder. The men don’t realize the plot of the murder took place in the kitchen.

Symbols are important, especially in literature. They have been known to inspire hope and life, in turn inspiring some of the most profound actions in the history of the world. Yet, humanity’s statement to symbols goes beyond us finding meaning in innominate or non-human objects. People assign humanity into objects, almost a part of themselves. This concept is clearly demonstrated in Susan Glaspell’s play, Trifles. The work contains many element of symbolism that make important and relieving comments on the characters of the play and the themes of the story.

In the early 1900’s, both males and females were perceived as complete opposites of eachother. Women were considered physically weaker and morally superior to men. The gender roles during this time period were clearly demonstrated in the play “Trifles”, by Susan Glaspell. At a first glance it may seem like the play is only about the death of Mr. Wright. The play could simply be interpreted that the characters all work together to determine the murderer of Mr. Wright. The initial perception overlooks how the women were treated during this time period. The men conclude that the women are incapable of finding the murderer of Mr. Wright only because they are female. Similarly, Mr. Wright does not think twice about how poorly he treats his wife

Marriage a sacred bond uniting two people who are so deeply in love that they can't live without one another, for even a second. Many couples in this situation take these marriage vows to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do us part. Those vows remain cherished throughout the years of marriage. Partner’s share intimate details and form a strong trustworthy bond with one another. Often couples settle into a routine, move out of the city and have children. Occasionally over time that love will fade; couples change and lose interest in one another and begin to look for a way out of marriage. In Susan Glaspell’s play Trifles, there is evidence to

“A Jury of Her Peers” is a short story written by Susan Glaspell in 1917 illustrates early feminist literature. The two female characters, Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale, is able to solve the mystery of who the murderer of John Wright while their male counterparts could not. This short story had been adapted from Glaspell’s one-act play Trifles written the previous year. The play consists of the same characters and plotline as the story. In both works, Glaspell depicts how the men, Sheriff Peters and Mr. Hale, disregard the most important area in the house, the kitchen, when it comes to their investigation. In the end, the women are the ones who find clues that lead to the conclusion of Minnie Wright, John Wright’s wife, is the one who murdered him. Both of Glaspell’s female characters illustrate the ability to step into a male dominated profession by taking on the role of detective. According to Critical Theory Today: A User-Friendly Guide, written by Lois Tyson, a reader-response critique “focuses on readers’ response to literary texts” and it’s a diverse area (169). Through a reader-response criticism from a feminist lens, we are able to analyze how “A Jury of Her Peers” and Trifles depict how a patriarchal society oppresses women in the early twentieth century, gender stereotypes confined both men and women and the emergence of the New Woman is illustrated.

Between December 1st and 2nd 1900, John Hossack (a farmer from Warren County, Iowa) was murdered with an ax by his wife while in bed. Inspired by the true story of Margaret Hossack, an Indianola, Iowa farm wife who was charged with the murder of her husband John. One of the reporters, Susan Glaspell, decided to write a literary version of this investigation and “Trifles” came to be. Susan Glaspell is a feminist writer from Davenport, Iowa who started off writing for a newspaper called Des Moines Daily News. Later on her literary career she left the journalism industry and founded a theatrical organization called ‘Provincetown Players’ on Cape Cod, Massachusetts. In Trifles, Glaspell covers issues regarding female oppression and patriarchal domination. Susan Glaspell’s one-act play still exists as a fascinating hybrid of murder mystery and social commentary on the oppression of women. When Margaret Hossack was charged with the murder of her sixty year old husband John, the man she had been married to for thirty three years, Indianola, Iowa. Killed by two blows to his head with an ax, John Hossack was thought to be a cold mannered and difficult man to be married to, but he didn’t deserve his death. In a cultural that denied women the right to vote or the ability to serve on juries, the community in which the Hossacks resided was not terribly different from the rest of the country. A women’s role was defined as more domestic than

In Trifles by Susan Glaspell, the central character remains unseen for the entirety of the piece. “The central character - the person whose actions are to be understood - is absent, thus rendering her all the more a figurative blank space” (Keetley 342). The audience never sees or hears Minnie Wright throughout the piece, and therefor cannot develop an accurate opinion of the outcome of the play, as they are missing vital information about Minnie’s personality. The audience and characters instead make several assumptions about the truth that cannot be verified without closer inspection of Minnie’s personality and experiences. Glaspell’s use of an unseen central character in Trifles causes the story to develop based on assumptions made by

While the men in the story where playing Sherlock Holmes looking for evidence that Mrs. Wright killed her husband, they missed the bad fruit and the bread left out of the bow, a quilt that was not finished and had a few bad stiches, an unclean table and a birdcage that was empty. They were so determined to find specific clues of the murder, that they missed the clues of the emotional abuse that Mrs. Wright was subjected to from her husband. They were also so busy criticizing everything that Mrs. Wright did or did not do, that they missed everything that was right in front of their eyes. They even slipped with some sexist remarks Mr. Hale says ‘Well, women are used to worrying over trifles’, not realizing that the women were in the room.

A trifle is something that has little value or importance, and there are many seeming "trifles" in Susan Glaspell's one-act play "Trifles." The irony is that these "trifles" carry more weight and significance than first seems to be the case. Just as Glaspell's play ultimately reveals a sympathetic nature in Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale, the evidence that the men investigators fail to observe, because they are blind to the things that have importance to a woman, reveals the identity of the murderer and are, therefore, not really "trifles," after all. Thus, the title of the play has a double-meaning: it refers, satirically, to the way "trifling" way some men perceive women, and it also acts as an ironic gesture to the fact that women are not as "trifling" as these men make them out to be. This paper will analyze setting, characters, plot, stage directions, symbolism, themes and genre to show how Glaspell's "Trifles" is an ironic indictment not of a murderess but rather of the men who push women to such acts.

Susan Glaspell's Trifles can be regarded as a work of feminist literature. The play depicts the life of a woman who has been suppressed, oppressed, and subjugated by a patronizing, patriarchal husband. Mrs. Wright is eventually driven to kill her "hard" (1178) husband who has stifled every last twitch of her identity. Trifles dramatizes the hypocrisy and ingrained discrimination of male-dominated society while simultaneously speaking to the dangers for women who succumb to such hierarchies. Because Mrs. Wright follows the role mapped by her husband and is directed by society's patriarchal expectations, her identity is lost somewhere along the way. However, Mrs. Hale and Mrs.

The feminist theory is always adapting to new cultural and always changing. What stems from the feminism theory is feminist literary criticism “feminist criticism examines the ways in which literature (and other cultural productions) reinforces or undermines the economic, political, social, and psychological oppression of women” (Critical Theory Today, 4 Feminist Criticism, pg. 79 Tyson, Louis). This theory shows us how patriarchal our society is and that’s how Susan Glaspell’s shows her work in her life time where women only had a few roles. They were to have house chores done, cook, and reproduce. Women in the early twentieth century felt it is time to stand up against patriarchal oppressions and which is why Glaspell’s work critiques the society we live in for restricting women. One of her most famous dramas, “Trifles”, Glaspell showed the females capability to stand up for one another. Gender issues play a role in everyday society, oppressing women economically, politically, socially, and psychologically. Glaspell tries to even explain through the title the feminism analyst as you read through her drama.

Susan Glaspell's Trifles explores the classical male stereotype of women by declaring that women frequently worry about matters of little, or no importance. This stereotype makes the assumption that only males are concerned with important issues, issues that females would never discuss or confront. The characters spend the entirety of the play searching for clues to solve a murder case. Ironically, the female characters, Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale, uncover crucial evidence and solve the murder case, not the male characters. The men in the play, the Sheriff, County Attorney, and Hale, search the scene of the crime for evidence on their own, and mock the women's discussions. The women's interest in the quilt,