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Trifles By Susan Glaspell Essay Questions

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“Trifles” by Susan Glaspell The play “Trifles” written by Susan Glaspell is a mysterious piece of writing that many may have enjoyed and left with some questions in their mind. When readers are left with questions, it shows that the audiences actually paid attention throughout the whole play. The play is about a mysterious crime investigation where a woman named Minnie Wright killed her husband, John Wright. As the investigation continues, one may see and understand how women were treated back in the days. What men think of the women and how men put themselves before women. The play opens in the kitchen with five characters, Sheriff Peters and his wife Mrs. Peters, Mr. Hale and Mrs. Hale, and the County Attorney Henderson. As the play begins, the males enters first and then the females. The men first warm their and then asks the women if they want to warm their hands as it was extremely cold outside, Mrs. Peters takes a step forward then says she is not cold. It seemed as she was afraid and she is a minority in the group of people. There many more evidences that shows how women were ignored even if they had the right idea of something. If women had to say something, the men would shut them off and not give them chance and not pay …show more content…

Hale and Mrs. Peters breaks off from the men to start their own investigation as they came to the conclusion that the men were looking at things from different perspective and weren’t looking at what they should’ve. Rather Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters tries to figure out the motive behind the murder of John Wright. As they continue with their own investigation of what the motive could be behind Mrs. Wright to murder her husband, they gathered many evidences which shows the reason for the murder and they were left stunned by those. The men were looking for scientific evidences, but he both ladies instead went to look for realistic evidences. Realistic evidences are definitely stronger then the scientific ones and both woman proved

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The men in this play are very arrogant and hard headed. The women in this play are very understanding and tend to notice little details and look into things more closely. At the start of the play the men were talking down upon the women. By the end of the play

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781 Words | 4 Pages

Men of the time ruled the roost while the women stayed home where they belong. Roles of men and women have changed drastically in 100 years. Back in the time of 1916 men were always superior to women no matter what the situation was. In Glaspell’s play characterization demonstrates how the women challenged the status quo. “My, it’s a good thing the men couldn’t hear us.

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This shows the attorney assumed that Mrs. Peters was bound to the law because she is the wife of the sheriff; however, he did not account that women were extremely underrepresented in the government because women could not vote or serve has juries. On the other hand, Mrs. Peters did believe in the laws when she states, “The law has got to punish crime, Mrs. Hale” (Glaspell, 191). This shows that Mrs. Peters strongly believe that the law will punish the crime that the murderer committed. However, Mrs. Hale did hold a different opinion about the law when she saw what Mrs. Wright went through when she married Mr. Wright. Mrs. Hale said, “I wish you’d seen Minnie Foster...

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Mrs. Wright is the main character in Susan Glaspell’s one-act play Trifles. While Mrs. Wright is being held by the police for her husband’s murder, a few men go to investigate her home, and a few women go along to gather some of her things to bring to her in jail. As the ladies collect Mrs. Wright’s possessions, they begin to come across trifles. The trifles include: a messy kitchen, a poorly sewn quilt, and a broken bird cage with a missing bird. The women view these items as important clues, and withhold their findings from the men so that they could help Mrs. Wright out of her troubles.

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1577 Words | 7 Pages

In this section of Drama and Dramatic Poetry, my English class read “Trifles” and “POOF!”. “Trifles” is a one-act play that is dramatic and serious. In this play, the husband, John Wright, was found strangled with a rope in his bedroom and all of the evidence points to his wife, Minnie Foster. The question explored throughout the play is why she killed him. The story hints that she was a victim of domestic violence, but the audience cannot be absolutely sure because it does not outright say it.

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560 Words | 3 Pages

Hale and Mrs. Peters, attempted to cover up the crime and succeeded. From the standpoint of those women, it’s easy to see why they did what they did. They knew that it was possible at one point they found out that Mrs. Wright wasn’t being treated right but they didn’t do anything about it. In the story it mentions Mrs. Wright being a hard person to get through the day with because he was so cold. Initially Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale weren’t intending on covering up Mrs. Wright, but after realizing what wrong was done to her, they knew what was right in their eyes.

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980 Words | 4 Pages

Mr. Hale, who is a witness, his wife, Mrs. Hale and Mr. Peters wife Mrs. Peter who are also introduced to the audience as they were gathering belongings to bring to Mrs. Wright to jail. During this investigation the prime and only suspect is John Wright’s wife, who claims she did not kill her husband. As soon as the characters are introduced in the play it is noticeable both the male and female gender have a role, the men must go find evidence and the females need to make themselves at home and keep to themselves. As the play moves along the males find evidence based on what seems evident and

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Trifles is a play by Susan Glaspell, who uses objects to elucidate the life of its main character without directly explaining what takes place. The concept of choosing objects to interpret or represent a situation without elaborating comes from the idea of using symbolism. Glaspell takes the reader into the mind of Mrs. Wright, the main character, whose husband has just been found murdered. In Trifles, Glaspell uses symbolism to illustrate the isolation and oppression that takes place in the life of one of its characters.

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1014 Words | 5 Pages

The characters in the play reveal some of the gender stereotypes through the way they are presented in the beginning of the play, “The sheriff and Hale are men in the middle life… They are followed

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There are certain ways people are supposed to behave based on gender. We all have different ideas of what the gender role is for both sexes. The county attorney states, “Minnie Wright, was not much of a housekeeper” (Glaspell 746). His manner towards women seems very superficial and dismissive. In the play, the men treat women as if they are mindless puppets whose only role is to serve them.

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409 Words | 2 Pages

Gender stereotypes are portrayed throughout the play. The male roles are the county attorney, sheriff, and the neighbor who is a farmer. The men have careers outside the home. They are in positions of power and authority. Glaspell portrays these men as taking charge of the crime scene.

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460 Words | 2 Pages

In Susan Glaspell's 1916 play ‘Trifles”, the absent character, Minnie Wright is suspected of killing her husband, though there is no clear-cut motive available to the County Attorney or Sheriff. We are introduced to both the crime and the suspect through the eyes of those present to investigate the crime and the wives there to gather personal items for her. In the statement given by Hale, we are advised that Mrs. Wright seems incoherent or dazed upon his encounter with her. Hale further states, when he inquired of her husband, Mrs, Wright showed no emotion or concern at the notification of her husband’s death.

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750 Words | 3 Pages

While both the women and the men in Trifles use different viewpoint on the solving of the murder, they both share the ambition to solve it. Both Mr. and Mrs. Peters and Mr. and Mrs. Hale shared the drive to have a criminal face the justice that they deserve, until Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters begin to sympathize with the suspect. However, other than these few similarities, the men and the women in Trifles severely

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373 Words | 2 Pages

The short drama named Trifles written by Susan Glaspell in 1916 opens with five characters entering the kitchen of Wright farmhouse. The owner of the farm house John Wright has been strangled to death with a rope in his farmhouse. The main suspect for this crime is Mrs. John, the neighbor Mr. Hale and sheriff’s wife is investigating this case. Sheriff asks to Mrs. John, “weren’t you sleeping’ in the bed with him?”(Glaspell 853) to find out about Mr. John’s death and his wife accepts the fact that she was sleeping next to him, but she had no clue how her husband died or who killed her husband. The man assume that woman cannot help them with this therefore they ignores them.

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1106 Words | 5 Pages

The play seems to ‘deny the significance, and even, occasionally the presence of the female characters, however, basing vast power on their chastity and fertility while revealing a patriarchal society. A patriarch society is one that is under the control of men. The males are the heads and the masters, the females are the tails and subjects (Dash, 81). In other words, it is a society that takes women as inconsequential people.

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