Friends - Trifles
Discussion: Symbols
In your groups you will be acting out one scene from Trifles that pertains to a symbol that will be given to you. Two members from your group will come up front and act out that scene. After they return to the group the remaining group members must explain to the class:
1. why your symbol is, in fact, a symbol
2. why the symbol is relevant to that scene
3. why the symbol is a clue to the crime
Discussion: Character Analysis
Final Discussion
Cherry Jar: p. 983 and 989
Quilt: p.988 (full page) & last sentence of p.990
Bird: p.987 (full page) & bottom of 988
Kitchen: 983-984 (include stage directions)
Find a passage that characterizes each of the people assigned. Examine what their perspectives are of the crime and the crime scene.
-Two discussion groups - Mrs. Hale, Mrs. Peters,
-Mrs. Wright - Find a passage including her that is important
-Two discussion groups - Mr. Henderson, Mr. Hale, Mr. Peters
Mr. Wright- Find a passage including him that is important
Character Analysis- Women
(15 mins)
-In your groups, discuss the question: “How do the gender roles in "Trifles" affect the characters' analysis of the crime scene?”
-Two groups discuss Mrs. Hale, Mrs. Peters
-Two groups discuss Mr. Hale, Mr. Peters, George Henderson
-Find textual evidence to support your claims
Symbols
5. Mrs. Wright: lively; then oppressed by marriage and domesticity
“She used to wear pretty clothes and be lively, when she was Minnie Foster, one of the town girls singing in the choir. But that--oh, that was thirty years ago.” (985)
“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.” (987)
6. Mrs. Hale: intelligent, observant , snappy towards men’s ignorance; but to herself
(observations on pgs 984, 985, 986)
“I might have known she needed help! I know how things can be—for women. We live close together and we live far apart. We all go through the same things--it’s just a different kind of the same thing.” (989)
7. Mrs. Peters: accepting of how things are; does not question men
{“I’d hate to have men coming into my kitchen, snooping around and criticizing.”}
“Of course it’s no more than their duty.” (984)
{I don’t see as it’s anything to laugh about.”}
“[Apologetically] Of course they’ve got awful important things on their minds.” (986)
“My, it’s a good thing the men couldn’t hear us. Wouldn’t they just laugh! Getting all stirred up over a little thing like a--dead canary! As if that could have anything to do with--with--wouldn’t they laugh!” (989)
Cherry Jar
"The single intact jar symbolizes the one remaining secret, the motive to complete the prosecutor's case. Almost by reflex, Mrs. Hale claims this jar. Near the plays close, both women decide to use the jar as a deception, so as to spare Minnie the knowledge of her loss. More importantly, they spare her another loss, that of her freedom, her life, for they conceal evidence of a motive, the final incident that prompted Minnie to kill. They lie to and for Minnie to protect her -- to clean up her mess." (Smith 175)
Symbols (2)
Quilt
"Mrs. Hale emphasizes the additional meanings of the term "knot it," meanings she is sure her investigators will not comprehend. "Knot it" conveys the sense of knotting the rope the husband's neck: they have discovered the murderess. And they will "knot" tell. Mrs. Hale speaks a language that Mrs. Peters can now understand, but from which those who are merely concerned with universally interchangeable facts will be excluded" (Alkalay 3)
Bird (Canary)
"A broken cage and a strangled bird are symbols of her restricted life, the birdcage is not the "gilded cage" of song and folklore. It is a cheap cage to match her own poverty, the result of fate or John's stinginess. The circumstances of her life have been more restrictive than real bars. Virtually held in solitary confinement, she has been shut off from childhood friends and neighbors, with only the taciturn John to share the isolation which he probably created. Did the pet canary's singing break the silence and brighten her days? Was the canary, silent or tuneful, an all too painful reminder of an irrevocable youth of white dresses and church choirs and of a bleak future sliding into old age?" (Smith 176)
Trifles (Kitchen)
Minnie's kitchen is criticized by the men. The county attorney says "Dirty Towels!" And says she isn't much of a housekeeper. Mrs. Hale then realizes that the towel is dirty because the deputy wiped his hands on it when he made the fire. "Her defense of Minnie is initially based on the hard life she knows a farm woman must lead, and the impossibility of perfection when the laws of the kitchen are created and violated by men." (Alkalay 3)
Character Analysis- Men
"Trifles" Video Clip
1. Mr. Wright: suitable on paper/in theory; cold, isolated, unloving
“Yes—good; he didn’t drink, and kept his word as well as most, I guess and paid his debts. But he was a hard man, Mrs. Peters." (987)
2. Sheriff- Henry Peters: Finds women & their activities insignificant but in a charming, dainty, and silly way; chuckles at comments George makes
“Well, can you beat women! Held for murder and worryin’ about her perserves.” (983)
“They wonder if she was going to quilt it or just knot it! [The men laugh, the women look abashed].” (986)
3. Lewis Hale: level-headed, young-spirited, not malicious
“Well, my first thought was to get that rope off. It looked... [Stops, his face twitches]...but Harry he went up to him, and he said, ‘No, he’s dead alright, and we’d better not touch anything.’ ” (982)
“Well, women are used to worrying over trifles.” (983)
4. County Attorney- George Henderson: ignorant, oblivious to the importance and difficulty of women’s work, condescending
“[With the gallantry of a young politician.] ...Dirty towels! [Kicks foot against pans under sink.] Not much of a housekeeper, would you say, ladies?...I know there are some Dickson county farm houses which do not have such roller towels.” (983)
[As one turning from serious things to little pleasantries.] “Well, ladies, have you decided whether she was going to quilt it or knot it?...Well that’s interesting, I’m sure.” (988)
[Facetiously] “Well, Henry, at least we found out that she was not going to quilt it. She was going to--what is it you call it, ladies?” (990)
Themes:
Women are individually trivial, but can find strength in numbers.
a.Female identity (gender sticking up for gender) the men assume women know nothing about the case when in reality they know more than them. (983,984,989,990)
The vastly different perspectives of men and women.
a.Views on women’s work
b.Views on what happens in the household between husband and wife
(abuse & isolation from outside world? or just “the way things are”?)
c.Views on what is important in the investigation:
men- go straight to the scene and disregard the kitchen, where Minnie spent her life; ignore the fact that she appears to have some kind of mental break (humanity?)
women- remain in the kitchen and look at the ‘trifles’ that make up a woman’s daily life, notice the inconsistencies, look from Minnie’s perspective and try to imagine what she was going through in order to understand why she might have killed Mr. Wright
Law vs. Justice
a.Differences in how justice is served: was Mr. Wright truly served for his deeds through his murder? Should there have been some other type of intervention?
b. In what ways was it right and wrong for the women to remain silent knowing what they know?
Glaspell's Effect on Women Writers
Themes & Critiques
One of the two most accomplished playwrights of twentieth-century.
Her drama can be said to be “on the edge.”
Central to Glaspell's plays is a concern with fulfilling life's potential, going beyond the confines of convention, safety, and ease to new and uncharted possibilities, both social and personal.
“Since the vast majority of regionalists were women, the definition of this genre [drama] as inherently minor functions to contain the work of American women in a separate category and to accord it secondary status, “sentimental” a label most often applied to Glaspell’s fiction, is a derogatory code word for female subject and women’s point of view and particularly for the expression of women’s feelings.” (Carpentier 96)
Susan Glaspell: Her Life
"Trifles"
Susan Glaspell
http://images.nypl.org/index.php?id=483676&t=r
Themes & Critiques (2)
Personal Life:
-Born in Iowa in 1882
-Educated at Drake University and
University of Chicago
-Viewed as a feminist with hints of socialism and idealism
-Married George Cook in 1913, the couple
moved to Cape Cod, Mass.
-"Although her writing was often critique of the faults of American capiltalist society and the narrowness of the bourgeois world, she loved America." (Shafer p. 75)
“The best of Glaspells plays are bold and imaginative in theme and characterization and sometimes in form, dealing with questions far in advance of most of the plays being written at the time: Can a women be justified in murdering a husband who has psychologically abused her? Although Glaspell deals with controversial themes in her fiction as well, her novels tend to be much more conventional in both form and content.” (Makowsky 389)
Mariah, Jackie, Molly, & Nicole
References
Alkalay-Gut, Karen. "Jury of her Peers: The Importance of Trifles." Studies in Short Fiction 21.1 (1984): 1-9. Web. 11 Mar. 2013.
Smith, Beverly. "Women's Work-Trifles? The Skill and Insight of Playwright Susan Glaspell." International Journal of Women's Studies 5.2 (1982): 172-184. Web. 11 Mar 2013
Little Theater Movement
Veronica Makowsky. "Susan Glaspell's Century of American Women: A Critical Interpretation of her Work."American Literature Volume 66, No 2. Web. June 1994
Martha C. Carpentier. "Susan Glaspell's Fiction: Fidelity as American Romance." Twentieth Century Literature , Vol. 40, No. 1. Web. Spring 1994
Began in Europe in 1887 and moved to America in 1911-1912
Many of these theaters were experimental.
The focus was not on the commercial aspects of the theater; they were meant for creativity.
One of the most famous "little theaters" in America was created by George Cook and Susan Glaspell.
They experimented with realism in their works, one being,"Trifles".
3.Shafer, Yvonne. "O'Neill, Glaspell, and John Reed: Antiwar, Pro-American Reformers."Eugene O'neill Review 32 (2010): 70-85. Humanities International Complete. Web. 10 Mar. 2013
4.Susan Glaspell. Milton Levin.American Writers: A Collection of Literary Biographies, Supplement 3. Ed. Lea Baechler and A. Walton Litz. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1991. Word Count: 10198. From Scribner Writers Series.
Provincetown Players Theater- Greenwich Village
http://blogs.shu.edu/glaspellsociety/sample-page/