Susan Glaspell's Use Of Symbols In “Trifles“

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In one of Susan Glaspell’s first plays “Trifles” (1916), her use of symbols serves to build characters and add emphasis to her main points. In “Trifles” the main symbols are used to illustrate the status of women in the early twentieth-century rural society. The play tells the story of two women coming to the house of a neighbour, Minnie Wright, who has been accused in the strangulation murder of her husband. They’ve come to collect some of Minnie’s things while the men, the sheriff, county attorney, and a witness, search for clues and answers. Minnie Wright is never seen in the play, but the audience can learn a lot about her character in Glaspell’s representation by use of symbols such as the house, Minnie’s quilt and the way she quilted it, the bird, and the sardonic title of the play.

“I stayed away because it weren’t cheerful - and that’s why I ought to have come. I - I’ve never liked this place. Maybe it’s because it’s down in a hollow and you don’t see the road. I dunno what it is, but it’s a lonesome place and always was” (Glaspell, 983). This is a description of the Wright’s house given by Mrs. Hale, a neighbour who Minnie in her happier days before marrying John Wright, as Miss Foster. Minnie’s life was very much like the life of the house, dreary, secluded, and lonesome. The house was down in the hollow where nobody could see, just like Minnie Wright was cooped up in the house where nobody would see her. John Wright did not give Minnie any money to buy nice clothes, so she was embarrassed to be out where all the other ladies were socializing. Minnie could not go out and buy things for herself; she could not spend the day in town if she wanted to. As a farm wife in the early twentieth century, Minnie had to stay home and be a housewife to the full extent of its meaning. John was out working all day and Minnie was stuck in the house to work and try to pass the time. Their house had �...