Oct 13, 2008

Trifles | Glaspell's Trifles

In this essay, Russell compares the three female characters in Glaspell's play to female characters of Greek mythology. The critic cites numerous examples from the text that support her thesis.

On the surface, Susan Glaspell’s one-act play Tri- fles focuses on the death of an oppressive husband at the hands of his emotionally abused wife in an isolated and remote farm in the midwest. Beneath the surface, the collective behaviors of Mrs. Hale, Mrs. Peters, and Mrs. Wright in Glaspell’s play bear strong resemblance to those of the Fates (Clotho the Spinner, Lachesis the Disposer of Lots, and Atropos the Cutter of the Thread) in Greek mythology. Although Glaspell brings new vigor to the myth, the attention given to Mrs. Hale’s resewing the quilt, the change in Mrs. Peters’s...