Robert Olen Butler is an author born in Granite City, Illinois who won a Pulitzer Prize. In writing

Four have already left home, one will leave soon and the other three still dwell in the house with her. She then begins to express the dangers of the world around her in a bird’s point of view. For example, she is afraid that her young will fall in a fowler’s snare, be caught in a net or by birdlime on twigs, or hurt by a hawk. In a human world a fowler’s snare might be fallings into the hands of trickery, robbery, or any other type of crime. Caught by net or birdlime might represent being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and a hawk-inflicted injury might symbolize being wounded or killed by an Indian or criminal.

Hale and Mrs. Peters find a dead canary and a broken bird cage, it becomes obvious that Mr. Wright was an aggressive and controlling husband. Mrs. Hale states, “No, Wright wouldn’t like the bird- a thing that sang. She used to sing. He killed that, too” (1012). The canary represents Minnie Foster. Before she married Mr. Wright, she was a joyful girl who sang in the church choir. After her and Mr. Wright get married, she is forced to stop singing and is stripped of her happiness. The broken cage represents Mr. and Mrs. Wright’s controlling marriage. The bird cage is violently broken to represent how Mrs. Wright violently escaped her marriage. The women’s discoveries cause Mrs. Peters to sympathize with Mrs. Wright. Ultimately, Mrs. Peters decides to stand up for what she believes.

In Robert Olen Butler's, "Jealous Husband Returns in Form of Parrot", the narrator finds himself unable to trust or communicate with his wife because of his own vulnerability and fears of losing her. Tragically it was his fear that killed him in the end; while trying to spy on his wife and the new guy from the shipping department in his bedroom, the narrator falls from a tree dying instantly and ironically is reincarnated as a handsome Yellow-nape Amazon Parrot. Although parrots can mimic sounds or words they hear, it seems there is only more of a communication gap between the two as fate reunited them together now as a widow and a pet bird. By the end of this story the differences in the narrator as a

In some instances, the women conform to and depart from the assumptions made by the men. Mrs. Hale has found an important piece of evidence, a dead bird. The ladies decide not to allow the men to know of the true reason for the bird's death. As concerns the loyalty of one woman to another, evidence is found in line 366 that seems to allude to such a bond. Line 366 begins:

In the story the father didn’t understand his daughter which made their relationship rocky. In the text it says ‘‘...watching him get out of the truck and walk toward me, noticing that there was no smile on his face but still feeling my body move toward him, my arms opening for an embrace, something rising in my throat. My father stopped and held out his right hand.’’ This quote shows that the father had a hard time showing his emotions to his daughter. In the end of the story they bonded over a bird and the father began to understand his daughter.

While talking, the women find a fancy box belonging Mrs. Wright. Inside the box, is what they believe to be Mrs. Wright’s dead pet bird. They realize that “somebody – wrung – its – neck” (1172) Remembering a similar incident in her life, Mrs. Peters says, “When I was a girl – my kitten –there was a boy took a hatchet, and before my eyes, ..If they hadn’t held me back I would have hurt him.” (1172) They place the dead bird back in the box, and then, surprisingly, they hide the box. You can almost see what’s going on in the mind of these two women as they must be imagining poor Mrs. Wright, horrified that her awful husband killed her bird, then she must have snapped and strangled him to end her own suffering.

One of the women made the comment that Mrs. Wright used to be pretty and happy, when she was Minnie Foster not Minnie Wright. This is just the beginning of realizing that she was just pushed to far into depression and couldn't live up to John Wright's expectations anymore. The Wrights had no children and Mrs. Wright was alone in the house all day long. The women perceive John Wright to be a controlling husband who in fact probably wouldn't have children and this may have upset Mrs. Wright. They eventually find vacant bird cage and ponder upon what happened to the bird, realizing Mrs. Wright was lonely they figured she loved the bird and it kept her company. The women make reference to the fact that Mrs. Wright was kind of like a bird herself, and that she changed so much since she married John Wright. They begin looking for stuff to bring her and they find the bird dead and they realize someone had wrung its neck. This is when they realize Mrs. Wright was in fact pushed to far, John Wright had wrung her bird's neck and in return Minnie Wright wrung his.

Henderson, when she says how she didn't think a “place’d be any more cheerful for John Wright’s being in it” (1051). And for the woman once known as Minnie Foster, it was that same man who eroded her until she no longer was one of the town girls as she had been thirty years before, no longer a woman who sang in the choir, her happy, hopeful spirit, gone. Her final comfort in that otherwise drained and dreary home was that little singing canary that she had bought a year before the events of “Trifles,” and whose death sets her off to finally murder her own husband by tying a rope around his neck killing him much in the way he killed the bird and her own spirit. This is a perfect example of something as wondrous as marriage gone horribly wrong.

Wright had broken the cage door and killed the bird. The only way the door could have become unhinged is if considerable force was used on it, because bird cages are built to last a long time. Mr. Wright, being a “bigger” man, provided that strength. Mrs. Wright could not have due to her small stature, unless provoked. The owner of the bird is Mrs. Wright. If the owner of the bird was Mr. Wright then he would not have broken into the cage because pet owners have no need to break into their pet’s cages. This also means that Mr. Wright intended to harm the bird when breaking into the cage. Mrs. Hale’s statement supports the notion of Mrs. Wright having a pet bird, “‘There was a man round last year selling canaries cheap-but I don’t know as she took one. Maybe she did. She used to sing real pretty herself,’” (13). Mrs. Wright would’ve also wanted a canary because of her husband’s personality. Mrs. Hale suggests that he had a cold personality, “‘But he was a hard man. Just to pass the time of day with him-.” She stopped, shivered a little.”Like a raw wind that gets to the bone.”...”I should think she would’ve wanted a bird!’” (14). The mutilated canary proves that Mr. Wright did break into the cage and he did in fact, kill the bird, as suggested by Mrs. Hale, “‘No, Wright wouldn’t have liked the bird,” she said after that-“a thing that sang. She used to sing. He killed that too.” Her voice tightened,” (17). The murdered bird is what Mrs. Wright was so angry about when she was sewing that one patch of the quilt. She would’ve been angry over the murder of the canary because she loved it, and people get angry when pets they love are hurt or killed. Mrs. Wright had wrapped the bird in silk and “she was going to bury it in that pretty box,” (16). Silk is expensive material and for Mrs. Wright to intend to use it for her canary’s burial indicates her love for the

Therefore, Mrs. Wright murdered her husband simply because he murdered her pet bird, and she did so the same way he murdered the bird, making the motive is unethical. Mrs. Hale finds a dead bird with a broken neck inside of Mrs. Wright’s sewing box wrapped in a cloth. Obviously as lonely as Mrs. Wright was the death of her bird would have been catastrophic for her. This is evidence of a motive proving Mrs. Wright killed her husband out of sheer revenge of the death of her bird, it was the last thing he was ever going to take away from her. Along with the broken cage Mrs. Peters states, “Why, look at this door. It’s broke. One hinge is pulled apart” (8). Then Mrs. Hale comments, “Looks like someone must have been rough with it” (8). This is how it happened, Mr. Wright came home from work in

As the ladies examine the house, while the men are other places, picking clothes and an apron up for Mrs. Wright, Mrs. Hale gains sympathy for her until finally she starts to take action. When they find the block of quilting that has stitching askew, she starts to fix it, perhaps to cover for Mrs. Wright?s distraught state of mind. While Mrs. Hale is finding sympathy for Mrs. Wright, Mrs. Peters offers a counterpoint that tries to justifies the men?s viewpoints and actions. Her comments to Mrs. Hale?s resentful musings on Mrs. Wright?s unhappy life and on the actions of men in regards to women in general all seem to be rote answers programmed into her by society and a desire not to cause any trouble. This all changes as soon as Mrs. Peters finds the bird.

Betrayal and loneliness are two of the hardest emotions to encounter in life. Nevertheless, at some point everyone will experience and be forced to deal with them. This is made even harder when they are caused by someone you love and trust.  In Meredith Hall’s “Killing Chickens”, she uses various literary devices such as metaphor, simile, and imagery as she processes her husband’s affair and describes having to kill chickens. Hall’s literary nonfiction is based on the happenings of a specific day that was truly hard to handle after being deceived by ones she loved:

Wright so deeply that her whole view of right and wrong is distorted. Her decision to murder her husband in the name of her bird shows how corrupted her mind really is. Years and years of silent torture drove this woman to the brink of insanity. Her insanity symbolizes other women in that time that chose to stay in a loveless marriage rather than make a bold move like Nora did and go out into world on their own. Nora’s courageous choice empowered women to think for themselves, while Mrs. Wright’s choice revealed to them exactly how a loveless marriage can damage one’s mind to the point of no repair.

Publica fama, what today’s society would call hearsay, was what everybody knew, so it was socially accepted as reliable (Fama 17). The husband’s actions put a stop to the lovers’ nightly talks but not before she sent the body of the bird to her love with a message explaining why she could no longer speak with him. Thus proving how strong the ideology of women being subservient to her husband in all regards.

?Sylvia still watched the young man with loving admiration. She had never seen anybody so charming and delightful, the woman?s heart, asleep in the child, was vaguely thrilled by a dream of love.? As the symbol of masculinity, the hunter is an aggressor although he is described to be kind, handsome, friendly and sympathetic. When first met Sylvia in the woods, he ?called out in a very cheerful and persuasive tone? and spoke to her in a courteous way. In fact, he takes advantages of Sylvia because he is in need of home and food. When he needs Sylvia?s help, he proves he cares for her so much, ?He listened eagerly to the old woman?s quaint talk, he watched Sylvia?s pale face and shining gray eyes with ever growing enthusiasm.? ?He told her many things about the birds and what they knew and where they lived and what they did with themselves. And he gave her a jack-knife, which she thought as great a treasure as if she were a desert-islander.? However, he is cruel and merciless to nature, his gun is a convention which is to destroy the nature. ?I have been hunting for some birds?. At the end, he goes away and does not help her family when she refuses to tell him about the heron?s nest.