Oct 11, 2008

Trifles | The Dubious Moral Message of Susan Glaspell's Trifles

Lane A. Glenn is a Ph.D. specializing in theatre history and literature. In this essay he explores the dubious moral message of Susan Glaspell’s Trifles.

Susan Glaspell’s Trifles concerns a woman who was once young, pretty, and outgoing until she found herself in a loveless marriage with a stern, anti-social farmer. Her isolation, the gloom of her surroundings, and her husband’s dispassion slowly drove her to the brink of insanity. She tried to fend off her depression with bits of gaiety—brightly colored quilting and a caged songbird—but when her husband, in a sudden act of aggression, broke the cage and killed the bird and its singing, she was driven over the edge.

In the middle of the night, she slipped a noose around her...