Analysis of Drama as a Social Commentary
Over the recent years, there has been a wide approval of drama as a critical tool for social commentary. Drama contains elements that mirror the society and life in general thus, apart from entertainment, drama informs and educates. Many playwrights utilize this powerful feature of drama to construct positive commentaries on the numerous incidences in the society. The commentaries influence organizations, people, and individuals to make positive changes within themselves and their surroundings. This paper hence attempts to analyze drama as a social commentary. In addition, the paper will examine the play Trifles and how Glaspell through the play symbolizes the controlling relationship between men and women.
Summary of the Play
Susan Glaspell's Trifles is a play about the effect of gender differences on the perception of duty, law, and justice. The plot of the play starts and ends within a single day. The play talks about the murder of John Wright through a combined plot with the aim of creating a single setting for the entire play. Mrs. Wright is the chief suspect of the murder of John Wright, while the County Attorney, the Sherriff, and Mr. Hale investigate the crime scene trying to find the sole reason drive for the crime. In the play, the women find the cage has a broken hinge and the bird is missing. Mrs. Peter's states that she was a friend to Mrs. Wright before she was married, John Wright. She posits that she was a beautiful songstress and who used the name, Minnie Foster. However, when she was married she abandoned her name and muted her singing voice. As the palsy unfolds, Mrs. Hale discovers a dead bird in Mrs. Wright's sewing box and realizes the main reason that led to the murder of John Wright. The dead bird reveals the theme of the play in that instance. Mr. Wright had caged the bird and later killed it. The bird symbolizes Mrs. Wright as the songstress Minnie Foster. The caging and death of the bird are symbolic for Mr. Wright caging Minnie Foster thus restricting her from flying away and singing. The death of the bird is a symbol for Mr. Wright killing Mrs. Wright's joy in singing. The audience sees that she had to kill the man who held her captive to free herself from the chains of bondage.
The Significance of the Title
The word Trifle means something of little importance or value. The name of the play is significant as it shows that the men in the play held no respect to women since they believed that they were of little importance to them and the society. The title is ironical when Mr. Hale in the play states that, "Well, women are used to worrying about trifles" (Glaspell, 10). The statement means that women love worrying about less important issues. For example, he is concerned that Mrs. Wright is not worried about the fact that she is the sole suspect in the murder of her husband. However, the title becomes ironical when the trifling women bits and pieces end up solving the case for the police.
Biographical Information of Susan Glaspell
Susan Keating Glaspell was born on July 1876 in Davenport Iowa and died on July 1948 in Provincetown, Mass. She was prominent for the short story 'A Jury of Her Peers' and the play 'Trifles', works inspired by her real-life experiences in 1900 as a courtroom reporter (Susan Glaspell Biography). In 1915, Susan Glaspell and her husband George Cram Cook founded the Provincetown Players an influential theater. Susan wrote several novels like The Comic Artist (1927), The Fugitive's Return (1929), and Alison's House (1930) a play that won the Pulitzer Prize award. The books and plays Susan Glaspell wrote employed satire and realism to condemn and address the issues prevalent in the society at that period. The plays performed in the Provincetown Players lead to a series of success and disagreements in the society (Susan Glaspell Biography).
Historical Look at Gender Differences during the Setting of the Play
Susan wrote the play Trifles in 1916, during this era inferiority of women over men was so prevalent. During 1900, the repression of women was evident in the society due to the patriarchal preference of the people (Scott). Thus, oppression was the norm as most people viewed women as less important in civility and status than men. In the 20th century, people believed in the separate sphere ideology where men and women were completely a different entity (Davidoff). They defined the separate sphere based on the physical characteristics of men and women. Many people deemed women as weak based on their natural traits, which made them weaker physically and superior in morals than men. Most saw this as a perfect idea to let women handle domestic issue since they had a weak physique. Women's role included bearing and taking care of the children, taking care of their homesteads and being graceful and quiet. The men controlled and restricted women from participating in debates about public issues or attract unnecessary attention. This might be the reason Mrs. Wright had to forget her singing career lest the public see her as immoral. In the public, there exists no middle ground between immorality and purity; one was either pure or immoral. The setting of the play is significant as it mirrors the gender differences in the area. The play does not only represent the difference in gender but demonstrates through actions and the negative perspective men had about women. Trifles play to prove that men were self-centered, aggressive, and had negative traditional stereotypes about women.
How Men and Women View Duty Differently
In the play trifles, the differences imply that the patriarchal society had no idea of the hardships trails and work that encircles a woman's life. Men thought and perceived women as a possession and gave little to no acknowledgment of the work and accomplishments they made in life. In the past men expected women to act as homemakers that included duties of cooking and cleaning. Women could not do any other jobs outside their homesteads a reason why Mrs. Wright stopped singing to carry her duties as a wife to John Wright. Men had a common stereotype that women could not think about any other issue except about their kitchens and homes, which made them insignificant. For instance, Hale states, "Well, women are used to worrying about trifles" is a statement that illustrates the demeaning attitude men held about the significance and intelligence of the women (Glaspell, 10). While investigating the murder of John Wright, the Sheriff, Hale, and the County attorney are all in Mrs. Wright's kitchen in the farmhouse. The kitchen is unorganized with leftover bread still on the counter and dirty dishes all over. The scene disturbs the men and they make promptly assume that Mrs. Wright is not tidy a woman. The County Attorney states, "It's not cheerful. I shouldn't say she had the homemaking instinct" (Glaspell, 11). The men judge Mrs. Wright as an untidy woman who lacks home keeping skills. On the other hand, the women are aware of the mess in the kitchen but still believe that the dirty dishes and the disorganized house is a reflection of a disturbed consciousness. For example, the women interpret the spoiled fruit in the kitchen as a sign that Mrs. Wright was a good home keeper who had the mind to save and preserve food for the future use of the family. The men interpret the spoiled fruits as an untidy. The men in the narrative believe that a woman's duty is to make the home clean, warm, decorated, and cheerful. While the incomplete duties of Mrs. Wright signify laziness and incompetent woman to the men, to the women it is a sign of mental disturbance and abuse.
How Men and Women View Law Differently
In this play, Glaspell does not just show about the gender differences between men and women in the society. Glaspell delves in the differences that exist in the perception and knowledge between men and women in different contexts. The Sheriff, the County Attorney, and Mr. Hale approach the farmhouse as a crime scene that completely affects their point of view and judgment. Additionally, the women go to the farmhouse as home trying to gather items that Mrs. Wright will need. The men come in an officially capacity trying to solve the murder of Mr. Wright while the women come as a friend to Mrs. Wright to help gather personal effects. Their motives completely alter the way they view scene and law in general. While the men focus on the means that led to the murder the women focus on the motive, which includes the emotions and actions that led to the murder. The men ask Mrs., Wright, "Tell now just what happened when you got in the house," as a way to uncover the crime (Glaspell, 7). The women moreover go into the house and ask for an Apron. They look into the small things the men regard as a trifle and discover the motive of the murder. Their dismissal attitude is apparent when the Sheriff tells the County Attorney, "Nothing here but kitchen things". Conversely, the women find crucial information that prompted the murder of John Wright. In addition, the men state that Mr. Wright was a hard a man but still believe that he was not out of line in handling his wife. The women attach emotions in the law to find the real reason for the murder while the men try to speculate on the motive but find no information about the murder. Their complete disregard of the kitchen shows that the men wanted to approach the murder from the male perspective and stay away from meddling in the women's affair and jurisdiction.
How Men and Women View Justice Differently
In the world, when someone commits murder it is normal that the culprit faces the justice system and pay for their crimes. 'Trifles' is a murder mystery story where the theme of justice is complicated and approached from different points of view. The women in the play consider that the murder of John Wright was justice to Mrs. Wright. When the women find the dead bird they piece the information that Mrs. Wright was socially oppressed, lonely and her pet bird brutally killed. They interpret that Mrs. Wright was kept from being the Minnie Foster that she was but forced to be someone else. The women rationalize Mrs. Wright's crime as actions of defense an escape from the mistreatment and prejudice. They try to identify with Mrs. Wrights situations when Mrs. Hale claims that, "we all go through the same things—it's all just a different kind of the same thing" (Glaspell, 23). Mrs. Hale furthermore feel guilty that she did not visit her neighbor often to realize the predicament she was in. "Oh, I wish I'd come over here once in a while! That was a crime! That was a crime! Who's going to punish that?" Mrs. Hale, assets when she realizes that the husband oppressed Mrs. Wright. The men in the play rationalize the actions of John Wright showing that he deserves justice for the murder. They do not share in the perspective that Mrs. Wright's actions were just, they instead view the murder as a crime. For example, the men believe that even though Mr. Wright was a hard a man, how he treated his wife was acceptable and not a crime. A home is a place where an individual feels peaceful and comfortable away from the drama and injustices form the society. Nonetheless, in Minnie's case, her home was a place full of psychological and physical abuse. Mr. Wright had completely cut her off from her life, her friends, and the neighbors. The women in the play show that Mrs. Wright was troubled and oppressed that why she acted in anger and frustration. They believe she deserved justice for the terrible life she lived and cover up the evidence they find in the sewing box.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the play Trifles is a well-organized exhibit of the patriarchal society, the arrogance and insensitivity men had in during the setting of the play. The play is successful in highlighting the oppression and the manner in which men viewed and treated women. It is evident that even though women in the society had a lot of knowledge they hid it form the men to avoid frown or reprimand form the society and the men. The play calls into question the patriarchal society and prompts the changes that will bring the end to the suffering and demeaning of the status of the women. The play specifically targets the construction of gender and the difference in the gender roles that exist in the society even today. The moral of the play is to ensure that the society improves, end the oppression against women, and accord them the respect they deserve. In the play in if the men had valued the input of the women instead of dismissing them, they would have found the evidence.
Works Cited
"Susan Glaspell Biography." Books, Events, Research, and More at Davenport Public Library, www.davenportlibrary.com/genealogy-and-history/local-history-info/history-faq/people/susan-glaspell/.
Davidoff, Leonore, and Catherine Hall. Family fortunes: Men and women of the English middle class 1780–1850. Routledge, 2013.
Glaspell, Susan. Trifles. Baker's Plays, 2010.
Scott, Joan Wallach. "Gender as a useful category of historical analysis." Culture, society and sexuality. Routledge, 2007. 77-97.
I believe Mrs. Wright was responsible for the murder of John Wright. While the men focused on forensic evidence, the women pieced together the minute details the shed light on the emotional and mental state of Mrs. Wright. First, she was completely cut off from the world and did not have anyone. The women, on the other hand, bring into focus the empty birdcage, the dead bird in the fancy box as well as the unfinished quilt. The event shows that Minnie was not stable and quite lonely she reacted in anger over the death of her bird thus killing John Wright.
