ipl-logo

Comparing Susan Glaspell's Trifles And The Yellow Wallpaper

1166 Words5 Pages

“Trifles” and “The Yellow Wallpaper” are early 20th century short stories that depict women’s suppressive role in society and the belief that women should be treated as subservient and substandard to men. Authors Susan Glaspell (“Trifles”) and Charlotte Anna Gilman (“The Yellow Wallpaper”) are both known for advocating feminism in their works of literature. “Trifles” and “The Yellow Wallpaper” exploit patriarchal dominance and its effect on suppressing women’s intellectual and societal equality. In each short story, the woman protagonist is depicted as trapped in her marriage. Common themes in these stories address the dominance of men towards women which affects the physical and emotional well-being of the female characters. The authors use symbolism, similes, metaphors and dramatic irony to exemplify patriarchal dominance and its suppressive treatment of women. In the early 1900s, patriarchal dominance reigned while women's roles were confined to raising children and taking care of their households and husbands. Men …show more content…

Gilman wrote “The Yellow Wallpaper” as an autobiography after she left her husband with their infant daughter. Gilman acted and spoke up for herself and her daughter. She strived for her independence. As we see in “The Yellow Wallpaper,” the alternative clearly leads Jane into psychotic breakdown (Barth). Similarly, “Trifles” was inspired by a murder that Glaspell covered while working as a reporter for the Des Moines Daily News (“About the Author— Susan Glaspell”). In the play, Minnie Foster was once a lively young lady before marrying her husband Mr. Wright. Mrs. Hale realizes he had taken everything she once loved away from her. Mr. Wright even took away her song bird that reminded her of the days she sang in the church choir. When Mr. Wright kills her song bird, she stands up for herself and decides he deserves the same

Show More
Related
580 Words | 3 Pages

Hale that Minnie Foster, before becoming Minnie Wright, used to sing in the choir. Mrs. Wright has now lost her song (550). Mr. Wright is described as a quiet man and this makes Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale begin to see why Mrs. Wright is now not as lively and spirited as she used to be; Mr. Wright had killed her song. Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale find a birdcage, and eventually find a dead canary that has been strangled, helping them to understand the means behind the way Minnie Wright killed her husband. The death of the canary was more to Mrs. Wright than just her pet dying; it was a symbolism of her own metaphorical death and it pushed her over the edge into killing her

Read More
801 Words | 4 Pages

In the nineteenth century, woman had no power over men in society. They were limited in their freedom, as their lives were controlled by their husbands. Some women did not mind this lifestyle, and remained obedient, while some rebelled and demanded their rights. “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and “The Birthmark” by Nathaniel Hawthorne, are short stories that exposes the lifestyle women lived in the nineteenth century. The protagonists from both stories, Jane and Georgiana, similarly lived a male dominated lifestyle.

Read More
557 Words | 3 Pages

The ladies open the box to find a dead bird wrapped up in a piece of silk. Mrs. Hale makes the remark, “I wonder how it would seem to never have a child around. Wright wouldn’t like the bird, a thing that sang. She used to sing, he killed that to.” It is obvious that all of these findings do give a small motive to why Minnie would have killed

Read More
1006 Words | 5 Pages

Authors, especially female authors, have long used their writing to emphasize and analyze the feminist issues that characterize society, both in the past and the present. Kate Chopin, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and Susan Glaspell wrote narratives that best examined feminist movements through the unreliable minds of their characters. In all three stories, “The Story of an Hour”, “The Yellow Wallpaper”, and “A Jury of Her Peers”, the authors use characterization, symbolism, and foreshadowing to describe the characters’ apparent psychosis or unreasonable behavior to shed light on the social issues that characterized the late 19th century and early 20th century. Penning many stories that demonstrate her opinions on the social issues of the era,

Read More
874 Words | 4 Pages

He caused her to be lonely and that caused her to go a little crazy. This madness is what made her feel no sympathy when she realized John was dead. These actions are what led Hale and Peters to come to the result of she killed her own husband. However, the attorney didn’t realize the radical alteration in her personality like Mrs. Hale did, only because he did not know Minnie Foster when she was beautifully happy and full of life. This is evident in the short story when the attorney refers to her as Mrs. Wright and Mrs. Hale

Read More
975 Words | 4 Pages

Mrs. Wright and Nora both have different personalities. Mrs. Wrights personality in the play is innocence. She exhibits this by not allowing Mrs. Hale to see John. She acts as if she is completely shocked by his death.

Read More
691 Words | 3 Pages

The women began to pity Mrs. Wright as they knew her before she married to Mr. Wright. The females felt pity, where the men just accessed the situation at hand. After the women examine the empty bird cage they remember the way that Mrs. Wright use to sing and compared her to her former self as Minnie Foster. “Trifles,” introduced the masculinity here from the Sheriff’s side instantly putting his instinct into saying that there was a murder that happened at the farmhouse, was caused by Mrs. Wright without any hesitation. He didn’t look into the sadness, or let the depressing home get to him as much as what his intentions and his well-being come into play before his

Read More
709 Words | 3 Pages

In “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman and “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been” by Joyce Carol Oates, both female protagonists are faced with opposing male forces that seek to control, undermine and take advantage of them. However, in the midst of the challenges and subordination they face from these dominant male figures, each protagonists independence is tested as they both strive to overcome these forces. Connie, the protagonist in “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been” is a 15 year old, narcissistic teenage girl, searching for independence through her sexuality as she enters into the realm of adulthood. “Everything about her had two sides to it, one for home and one for anywhere that was not home,” (Oates, 1).

Read More
1480 Words | 6 Pages

Charlotte Gilman’s short story, ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’, (1899) is a text that describes how suppression of women and their confinement in domestic sphere leads to descend into insanity for escape. The story is written as diary entries of the protagonist, who is living with her husband in an old mansion for the summer. The protagonist, who remains unnamed, is suffering from post-partum depression after the birth of her child and is on ‘rest’ cure by her physician husband. In this paper, I will try to prove that ‘The Yellow Wallpaper’ acts as a subversive text by portraying the protagonist’s “descent into madness” as a result of the suppression that women faced in Victorian period.

Read More
1238 Words | 5 Pages

Mrs. Hale even once said, “She—come to think of it, she was kind of like a bird herself—real sweet and pretty, but kind of timid and fluttery. How—she—did—change” (Glaspell 1205). When John killed the bird, he killed that final, small piece of Minnie. That was his final

Read More
1295 Words | 6 Pages

Women in the 1800’ and early 1900’s were treated the same as slaves, second class citizens who had no voice or decision over their lives. In the short story “The Yellow Wallpaper” written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman in 1892 with a late American 19th century setting. The main character, a nameless woman, fights depression and anxiety along with being oppressed by her husband John and wanting to rise against the norms of

Read More
1106 Words | 5 Pages

Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper,” the narrator, Jane, has postpartum depression. In order to cure this depression, John, Jane’s husband and a doctor, administer the rest treatment on her. Gilman wrote “The Yellow Wallpaper” through her personal experience. Along with writing “The Yellow Wallpaper” she wrote an explanation for why she wrote “The Yellow Wallpaper.”

Read More
923 Words | 4 Pages

The Yellow Wallpaper: Postpartum Depression In Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s short story, “The Yellow Wallpaper” the character, who is unnamed, is a young, high and middle class woman in the 1890’s. She suffers from what we now call postpartum depression, when a woman, after giving birth, goes into depression. She is married to John, who is physician and can be very controlling over the narrator's actions and choices making it seem as if he is only protecting her in her eyes. John brings her, the baby, mary and jennie to their summer house for a vacation. The house is described as a haunted house.

Read More
1091 Words | 5 Pages

Gender Inequality: A Woman’s Struggle in “The Yellow Wallpaper” In “The Yellow Wallpaper”, Charlotte Perkins Gilman captures the lives of women in a society based on societal expectations during the late nineteenth century. She focuses on the issue of gender inequality where women were often discriminated against and expected to fulfill the role of a perfect wife and mother. The narrator is based on on Gilman’s personal experience of suffering from her treatment for postpartum depression due to the social restrictions on women which represents a reflection on women's social status in society. The narrator, who remains anonymous, is depicted as a depressed and isolated prisoner who is oppressed under her husband’s control and struggles to break free.

Read More
799 Words | 4 Pages

Her husband was very cruel and strict and could not stand the singing of her bird, so one day the husband had snapped the neck of the poor singing bird with small piece of rope. This was the breaking point for Minnie Foster, so one night while her husband was sleeping she took a rope as well and chocked her husband to death. She re-created the scene of the bird incident because of how much that bird meant to her. The other two women were extremely understanding in Minnie’s situation, “They identify with her, quite literally. In her first line, Mrs. Hale defends the accused women’s house-keeping from the county attorney’s attack” (Holstein, par 7) which showed it common for the house wife at this time.

Read More

More about Comparing Susan Glaspell's Trifles And The Yellow Wallpaper

Open Document