Trifles By Susan Glaspell Essay

Trifles was written in the early 1900's by Susan Glaspell. This occurred far before the women's movement. Women were generally looked upon as possessions to their husbands. Their children, all wages, and belongings were property of their husbands. In Glaspell's story it is easily depicted as to what role the men and women portrayed in society at this time.

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.

Mr. Wright is not frightened by the consequences of his actions towards Mrs. Wright and her belongings. The County Attorney thoroughly examines the relationship between Mrs. Wright and Mrs. Hale. Mrs. Hale explains how she has “ . . . not seen much of [Mrs. Wright] of late years” (Glaspell 4) which reveals how isolated Mrs. Wright is. Mr. Wright does not think twice about keeping his wife secluded from everyone because he thinks Mrs. Wright is incompetent in expressing her feelings towards him. The dead canary is found by the women and they debate whether Mr. Wright was a factor in the death of the bird. Mrs. Hale replies to Mrs. Peters that “ . . . Wright wouldn’t like the bird--a thing that sang. [Mrs. Wright] used to sing. He killed that too” (Glaspell 9). Despite his wife’s feelings, Mr. Wright believes that he can get rid of anything to satisfy his happiness.

“Somehow, we just don’t see how it is with other folks till, something like this happens.” (page 15) So Mrs. Hale suggests she take in the quilt to help ease the mind of Mrs. Wright. As the ladies are searching for the rest of Mrs. Wright’s sewing items they locate a nice box in which they thought were her items. After noticing it was not the rest of her items and they may have just found the motive to the unexplained murder.

Mrs. Hale starts looking for the rest of her sewing supplies, and discovers the dead bird wrapped up in a piece of cloth with its neck wrung, just like how Mr. Wright died. They soon realize what Mrs. Wright did to her husband, and that Mr. Wright killed her bird. The men investigating the murder do not realize there ever was a bird, so Mrs. Hale took it and hid it from Mrs. Wright’s things before it could be found as a motive. Mrs. Hale says, “I might have known she needed help!” Mrs. Hale regrets not being there more often for Mrs. Wright and possibly could’ve prevented such a disaster.

This was an interesting play, especially when there really was not any physical evidence that proved Mrs. Wright was guilty. It was all suspicion - the signs that made Mr. Peters think Mrs. Wright committed the murder: Mrs. Wright giggling when Mr. Hale asked where Mr. John Wright was; he came to see if he wanted to go with him to see about a party telephone, the house was cold, and she seemed more concerned about her preserves than worrying about her dead husband.

The play examines the relationships between husbands and wives and reflects stereotypes of gender, particularly a marriage that ended in murder. The setting, a messy kitchen, reflects to me that the women stand together, emphasizing both the way they have been pushed together by their male-dominated society but also, possibly, their loyalty to each other over their husbands, a topic explored in the play. The men repeatedly dismiss things as beneath their notice if they are things such as the canning jars of fruit that are, in their opinions, women’s concerns. The men never recognize that they have forced the women to be concerned about these things, by not allowing them to be concerned about anything else. The men’s dismissal reflects a larger mindset of devaluing women and their opinions and interests in general.

The play takes place in an abandoned farmhouse in which Mr. and Mrs. Wright used to live in. Mr. Wright was found dead with a noose around his neck and the only suspect is Mrs. Wright who appears strangely calm through the situation. As the county attorney and sheriff investigate the house, Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale notice things that make

The reasons behind Mr. Wright’s demise are obscure, till clues unveil a home environment in which may be considerably enough for such action. The audience is introduced to Mrs. Wright’s situation according to the recollection of her neighboring farmer Lewis Hale, his wife Mrs. Hale, the sheriff and his wife Mrs. Peters as Mrs. Wright has already been taken into custody in suspicion this murder. Mrs. Hale tell the county attorney that the home “never seemed like a cheerful place” as well as telling Mrs. Peters that “he was a hard man”. Implying that this may very well have been a broken home, this followed by another exchange the will point in the speculated domestic abuse. Mrs. Peters discovers a bird-cage that had been placed in a cupboard, only to find Mrs. Wright’s bird to which the cage had belonged.

Abandoned places are always ready to tell a story, even the newly deserted ones. In Susan Glaspell’s play “Trifles,” the setting is the still, recently abandoned kitchen of a recently dead Mr. Wright. The story focuses on the sheriff’s and witness’s wives and their slow realization of who killed Mr. Wright and why. These realizations could not have happened if the wives were anywhere other than where they were. The time period, the kitchen itself, and the cheerlessness of the house all assist in unraveling the story of a house to be left behind.

Susan Glaspell’s most memorable one-act play, Trifles (1916) was based on murder trial case that happened in the 1900’s. Glaspell worked as a reporter, where she appointed a report of a murder case. It was about a farmer, John Hossack who was killed while he was asleep in bed one night. His wife claimed that she was asleep next to him when the attack occurred. No one believed in her statement, she was arrested and was charged on first degree murder.

The play Trifles takes place in a rural area and centers around a woman, Mrs. Wright, who has been accused of killing her husband by strangling him. The act starts off in Mr. and Mrs. Wright’s home on a cold, winter morning the day after Mr. Wright’s body was discovered by the neighbor; the county attorney, the sheriff and his wife and the neighboring farmer and his wife are all inside the

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.

"Trifles" is a play with a unified plot. Although there are verbal flashbacks to the events of the day of the murder of John Wright, the play's entire plot begins and ends in a span of one day. The author also extends the unified plot to create a single setting (the farmhouse kitchen). The plot centers on John Wright's murder. Mrs. Wright is the main suspect; an investigation is taking place as to the motive or reason for the crime.

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,