Mrs. Hale’s intentions in “Trifles” could be interpreted in a multitude of ways. Mrs. Hale’s actions show that she wants to help her old friend Minnie get her life back. Throughout the poem Mrs. Hale’s when talking about Minnie had a pitiful tone. Mrs. Hale felt bad for Minnie and what had become of Minnie’s life. When the police start their investigation at the farmhouse, Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters are there to help Minnie get her things in order. Mrs. Hale shows that she cares for Minnie and…
Trifles is an exciting drama told back in the early 1900s. The play begins after Mrs. Wrights husband has been found strangled in his house. The neighboring farmer and local sheriff arrive to investigate. Mrs. Hale is the wife of the neighboring farmer that arrives. Mrs. Hale was use to dealing with sexism, and had a strong independent air about her. With grace she wasn’t afraid to bark back at the men, even though she did so respectfully, and in her own quaint little way. When she says to the…
In 1916, Susan Glaspell, American female author, wrote the play Trifles for the Provincetown players Production. Glaspell’s work explores the dynamic of the bond and relationship among women, specifically during this time of the women’s suffrage movement. Susan Glaspell’s play Trifles, written in 1916, was rewritten to become what is known as the 1917 short story, “A Jury of Her Peers. “Through comparison and contrast, Glaspell’s play verses the short story shows changes in the extent of detail,…
Hale and Mrs. Peters also have a kinship to Minnie, just as to each other. They respect her work as a homemaker. Mrs. Hale quickly comes to Minnie's defense when her housekeeping skills are questioned, saying, "'There's a great deal of work to be done on a farm'" (1326). The women display their loyalty to each other and their sympathy for one another, too. Mrs. Peters can identify with the loneliness and sadness of losing something you love. She understands "'what stillness is,'" and Mrs. Hale…
“A Jury of Her Peers”, published in 1927, written Susan Glaspell, is a short story based on the 1900 murder of John Hossack. The short story was originally written as a one-act play in 1916. In 1950, the short story then became an episode of the television series Alfred Hitchcock Presents. Years to follow, in 1980 the short story became a short film that was nominated for an Academy Award. Growing up in a town that did not believe in women’s rights to employment and education, Glaspell still…
My Substitute Capabilities Two women solve a murder with their instincts in a suspenseful story written by Susan Glaspell called “A Jury of Her Peers”. The characters in “A Jury of Her Peers”, precisely the women, each used an alternative literacy to understand what events went on the day a farmer’s wife committed a crime. Alternative literacy is one’s ability to interpret actions of living things or events through counts of practice and knowledge of the matter. Reading animals and people are…
Susan Glaspell's "Trifles" is a one act play based in the early 20th century that includes strong feminist elements that fit well with the time and the world-wide women's rights movement. The play is a murder mystery surrounding the Wrights, Mrs. Wright the wife, and John Wright the murder victim. The story also uses the general mood of society toward women and how they were viewed as beneath most men and not having the intelligence or ability to perform as well as men in most situations. The…
“Lamb to the Slaughter”, a short story written by the celebrated author Roald Dahl, is a story that follows Mary Maloney, a pregnant housewife who had recently found out her husband, a chief detective, was going to leave her. Out of desperation, Mary murders her husband with a frozen leg of lamb and then concealing her wrongdoing and discarding the murder weapon by encouraging the policemen who were investigating the murder to eat it. The most salient idea the author explores is the betrayal;…
In 1893, a woman named Sarah Collins was brutally murdered by her husband, Patrick Collins, in the cloakroom of the kindergarten at which she was a janitress. In his novel, McTeague, Frank Norris eerily echoed this case, which was claimed to be evidence of social Darwinism. The novel, named after the protagonist, is centered on a man named McTeague, a hulking and dim-witted dentist, and the events that befall him and those around him. Though the novel initially met much resistance and little…
Both Trifles by Susan Glaspell and The Sound of a Voice by David Henry Hwang share common traits, despite the obvious differences. They share mysteries and certain portrayals of women during the time periods. These will be discussed along with any influences the authors had when they were writing these plays. The first common trait is the mysteries both plays hold. The murder mystery in Trifles, the mystery of who the woman is in The Sound of a Voice, and the mystery of why the man came to the…