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¶ … Susan Glaspell's Trifles
Analysis of Symbols in Susan Glaspell's Trifles
Although short, Susan Glaspell's play, Trifles, is packed with key symbols that, thoroughly examined, offer a close look at the isolation and hopelessness that characterized the life of some women in the early 20th century. In particular, Glaspell uses the setting of the kitchen -- the traditional sphere of the woman -- to provide several symbols and offer biting social commentary delivered through vastly different gendered speakers, the male investigators and Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters.
The first crucial symbol in Trifles is the jarred fruit. The men immediately perceive the sticky fruit that has emerged from the broken jars as a mess, and they immediately seize the opportunity to comment on Mrs. Wright's poor housekeeping. In sharp contrast, Mrs. Peters explains that the jars cracked because of the kitchen fire had gone out and notes that Mrs. Wright had worried about...
When Mrs. Hale discovers an unbroken jar of cherries, she seems transported by her own memories of canning cherries the previous summer. In particular, she recalls the hard and hot work that went into that work. Indeed, the careful way that Mrs. Hale retrieves and cleans that unbroken jar of cherries symbolizes her respect for Mrs. Wright's work and her role as keeper of the kitchen and home.
Looking more deeply, the cherries themselves are fruit that must be consumed or preserved in just a short window of summer. As such, they can also symbolize the fleeting happiness and tremendous sadness of the Wright home. One preserves summer fruit with hopes for a sweet and sunny treat in the dead of winter. Only one jar of this canned "happiness" survived the coldness of the Wright home -- surely, Glaspell intended to carry a message of sadness and solitude with this symbol.
The birdcage is another striking sign of Mrs. Wright's losing…
While men ignore the kitchen as containing "nothing but kitchen things," women look for evidence precisely there because it is the only place where women are in control. As Holstein (2003) argues, women do not enter the house of Mr. Wright as a place of investigation but as a home of two human beings who have feelings. For men, what matters is the evidence and if they find one,
TRIFLES by Susan Glaspell In "Trifles" by Susan Glaspell, the characteristics of the women and the attitudes to their men and their own roles in life are gradually illuminated. The intensity of the situation, in effect two women judging the life of the third, absent party, provides a context in which Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peter grow significantly, in character, strength and importance. The principle characters in the play are effectively the
Trifles by Susan Glaspell depicts a world in which women are ignored in society. The play takes place in the Wright home after Mr. Wright has been murdered. Mr. Peters and Mr. Hale come to the scene to investigate the crime that has taken place. The investigators believed that Mrs. Wright is to blame for her husband's death, but they have no idea why should would do that. As the
How -- she -- did -- change."(Glaspell) the second sense of the play's title becomes obvious: there is no place in the male world of overt action for women's fragility and sensibility, symbolized by the singing bird. The two wives intuitively understand that Mrs. Wright's husband could not understand or like "a thing that sang": "No, Wright wouldn't like the bird -- a thing that sang. She used to
Trifles In Susan Glaspell's play, "Trifles," a main theme is that of gender's roles in society. The women had to take care of the household, while the men's role was as public figure. The canary is one of the most important symbols in the play, because it represents the freedom of Mrs. Minnie Wright, before and after the marriage. The author describes her as being full of life "She used to wear
Susan Glaspell's Trifles The title of Susan Glaspell's drama Trifles indicates that it will deal with seemingly small matters: as Mrs. Hale says of the pivotal prop in the stage-play -- "Wouldn't they just laugh? Getting all stirred up over a little thing like a -- dead canary!" (Glaspell 27-8). Yet Mrs. Hale's sense that, if a male audience could see her dialogue with Mrs. Peters in Trifles by Susan Glaspell,