Of Drama, Susan Glaspell and Trifles…

Salam and good day everyone!

Now this entry is about one of the prominent writers in America named Susan Glaspell and her works. Her famous play, Trifles is definitely a play to ponder upon. But before that, I would like to write about what is DRAMA?

Drama, in literature, consists of texts of plays that can be read, as distinct from being seen and heard in performance.

Drama also is defined as a composition in prose or verse presenting in dialogue or pantomime a story involving conflict or contrast of character, especially one intended to be acted on the stage; a play.

There are a few elements that made up a drama including character, soliloquy, monologue, dialogue, action, plot, setting, symbolism, ironies, and most of all, theme.  

Moving on to Susan Glaspell...

So here’s a brief biography of the woman behind Trifles:

Susan Glaspell was born in 1882 in Davenport, Iowa. She graduated from Drake University and worked as a journalist on the staff of the Des Moines Daily News. When her stories began appearing in magazines such as Harper’s and The Ladies’ Home Journal, she gave up the newspaper business. In 1915, Glaspell met George Cook and founded Provincetown Players on Cape Cod, Massachusetts.

Her writing is strongly feminist, dealing with the roles that women play, or are forced to play, in society and the relationships between men and women. She wrote more than 10 plays for the Provincetwon Players, including Women’s Honor (1918), Bernice (1919), Inheritors (1921), and The Verge (1922). In 1931, she won Pulitzer Prize for Alison’s House, a play based loosely on the life and family of Emily Dickinson.

As for Trifles, the story starts with the sheriff Henry Peters and the county attorney George Henderson arrive with the witness Lewis Hale, Mrs. Peters, and Mrs. Hale at John Wright's farmhouse, where the police are investigating Wright's murder. Lewis Hale recounts how he discovered Mrs. Wright acting bizarrely, as she told him that her husband was murdered while she was sleeping. Although a gun had been in the house, Mr. Wright was gruesomely strangled with a rope. The men continually criticize the women for worrying about trifles instead of about the case, but Henderson allows the women to collect some items for Mrs. Wright, who is in custody, as long as he agrees that the objects are irrelevant to the case.

While the men are investigating upstairs, Mrs. Hale reminisces about how happy Mrs. Wright had been before her marriage, and she regrets that she had not come to visit Mrs. Wright despite suspecting the unhappiness she had suffered as John Wright's wife. After looking around the room, the women discover a quilt and decide to bring it with them, although the men tease them for pondering about the quilt as they briefly enter the room before going to inspect the barn. Meanwhile, the women discover an empty birdcage and eventually find the dead bird in a box in Mrs. Wright's sewing basket while they are searching for materials for the quilt. The bird has been strangled in the same manner as John Wright. Although Mrs. Peters is hesitant to flout the men, who are only following the law, she and Mrs. Hale decide to hide the evidence, and the men are unable to find any clinching evidence that will prevent her from being acquitted by a future jury - which will, the play implies, most likely prove sympathetic to women.

In my honest opinion, Trifles manages to bring the idea of women as a force to be reckon with. Who knows that at the end of the day, when men are seen so hardworking and believable, could not notice such small detail that would eventually lead to their ultimate finding of the case?

toodles.