Ironic Humor in Trifles by Susan Glaspell

Symbols in Trifles of a Woman’s Oppression

As Ben-Zvi notes, “women who kill evoke fear because they challenge societal constructs of femininity—passivity, restraint, and nurture” (141). For this reason, Susan Glaspell couched her play Trifles in comedic irony show as to show the real effects of oppressed womanhood that finally explodes in a way that would get the point across to the audience without frightening it to death. After all, the play was written at a time before women had even received the right to vote in 1920. It was conceived decades before the Feminist Movement came into existence during the 1960s following Betty Friedan’s landmark work The Feminine Mystique. Trifles contrasts sharply with the view of womanhood that had emerged by the end of the 20th century, at which point women had entered into the workforce, were running large companies, and were no longer expected to stay in their homes like birds in cages. This paper will show how Glaspell uses symbolism in Trifles to illustrate the oppression of womanhood prior to their sociopolitical emancipation in the 20th century—and the ill effects that could follow that oppression when the jars of sanity began to break.

Symbols abound in Trifles—and all of them serve as an indication of how Mrs. Wright was pushed the brink. First, there is the symbol of the rocking chair—a chair that is never still or firmly planted on the ground but always moving back and forth, front to back. It is a symbol of nervousness and unsteadiness. It is a symbol of a mind that should be at rest but is always in motion. At the beginning of the play, Mrs. Wright is found in her rocking chair appearing calm and sedate—but the reality is that she is quite troubled and has been very active (in killing her husband). Like the rocking chair, however, she doesn’t let on but says only that her husband “died of a rope around his neck” (Glaspell 981)—the type of ironic line that Glaspell delivers with gusto to fill the play with subtle humor.

Mrs. Wright is taken to jail for holding while the investigation is conducted. While there she asks for her apron. The women accompanying their husbands during the investigation remark that she won’t have much need of an apron in jail but they miss the meaning behind the symbol. The apron is the symbol of the domestic uniform: now that Mrs. Wright has been freed of her tormenter, she is willing to get back to work so to speak. For a women in a rural, remote part of the country, not having known any other activity, this makes total sense: she is simply returning in her own mind to what she knows best—house keeping.
Then there are the symbols of the dead bird (neck wrung) and bird cage. The bird is a symbol of Mrs. Wright herself: “She—come to think of it, she was kind of like a bird herself—real sweet and pretty, but kind of timid and—fluttery” (Glaspell 987)—and the fact that her husband killed it was the moment that Mrs. Wright stopped being herself. Like the broken jars (another symbol) that would crack in the winters, Mrs. Wright’s mind finally cracked from so many years of having to live in a cage without music (Mr. Wright would not allow her to play) and without love. So she in turn manifested her escape—violence upon Mr. Wright (death by rope). The quilt symbolizes her descent into madness—the pattern going all haywire and the knot symbolizes the murder weapon—her admission.

In conclusion, Glaspell could not very easily depict a woman murdering her husband as a consequence of his cruelty in an era before women could even vote. So she couched her play in ironic humor and symbols to show the reality of what a situation like this can be for women when they are trapped by men who show them no love and expect them to live like incarcerated birds in cages without feeling or a mind of their own. When the mind and feeling finally break free and lash out, the results can be truly frightening, as Mrs. Wright’s case shows.

Works Cited

Ben-Zvi, L. “‘Murder, She Wrote’: The Genesis of Susan Glaspell’s ‘Trifles’.” Theatre Journal, vol. 44, no. 2 American Scenes (May, 1992), pp. 141-162.

Glaspell, Susan. Trifles. http://www.english.unt.edu/~simpkins/Trifles.pdf