What is the significance of the title 'A Jury of Her Peers'?

A Jury of Her Peers is a fitting title because it describes the understanding that was between the women as to what Minnie Wright had gone through, and they acquitted her of murder. Minnie had been badly treated, over- worked, and under-appreciated. Without the work that the women did, no one would survive the winter. The women kept the house, canned the food, and took care of everyone. However, the ones who came and investigated the crime were men who did not appreciate the value of what Minnie, or any of the women, did. They did not see the hard work that they put in, and they had no understanding of everything that the women had been through, but the women had understanding and empathy for her because they were truly her peers. They lived the same life. Most of the tension in the story has to do with what the women know to be true and what the men are just unable to see.  There are a number of small things that give the women hints as to what Minnie had been through. They saw the messy kitchen, canning supplies, and erratic quilt-stitching as important while the men did not see the value or importance in the small things.

What is the significance of the title 'A Jury of Her Peers'?

In law, the idea of a jury of your peers is so that there will be a balance of information. If someone isn't your peer, he or she might not understand your actions (or the laws that govern them). If someone is, he or she is more likely to produce both justice and a balanced judgment. In Glaspell's great story, it is a jury of "her" peers because the situation is specifically female. Both the story and the play version show that in that time, it was not possible for a man to fully understand a woman's actions in Mrs. Wright's situation. Instead, to have a fair judgment, she must be tried by women (as the two women in the story do).

What is the setting of "A Jury of Her Peers"?

The setting of this story is in a rural American community, Dickson County, at the turn of the twentieth century. This setting is extremely important to establishing the plot and themes of the story. 

The overriding impression we get in this story is of the emptiness of Minnie Wright's life which drives her to despair. In this kind of farming community, at that time, there would be few opportunities for women to do anything but keep the house; that was the only sort of work they could do, while the men were out working the farms. If a woman were happily married, with children to bring up, this would be alright, but for someone trapped in a loveless, childless, and indeed abusive marriage, like Minnie, there really was no escape from a bleak existence. Divorce was not readily available at the time, and much stigmatized. A woman like Minnie would be expected to bear her lot, no matter how lonely and isolated she might be. The loneliness of the Wright farm is emphasized; it is off the beaten track, down in a hollow. It appears as a grim place.

Martha Hale, one of Minnie's nearer neighbours, feels compunction at not having done more for Minnie. She feels guilty that she didn't make the effort to visit her more often:

'Oh, I wish I'd come over here once in a while!' she cried. 'That was a crime! That was a crime! Who's going to punish that?'

Minnie's only recourse, finally, is to kill her husband, by all accounts a thoroughly mean-spirited, domineering man. Her fellow-women, Martha Hale and Mrs Peters, realize the intolerable conditions of her life which finally drove her to extreme action. 

What is the setting of "A Jury of Her Peers"?

The play is written in the early 1900's in an agricultural community in America.  Probably mid-west, but no specifications were made.  This setting is important since Minnie was isolated and alone in her misery.  Had she not been, things may have turned out differently for her and her husband.

The author, Glaspell, wrote the play after seeing an article in the newspaper about an abused woman who killed her husband.  Apparently, like Minnie, the woman in the article had reached a breaking point and took matters into her own hands.

Keep in mind that this is a time period where divorce and separation were just not done, so the woman had either to suffer through it, die, or kill her abuser.  The point of this play is to bring about the realization that just because there were fewer divorces or cases of domestic abuse reported in the early 1900's doesn't mean they were all blissfully happy.

What literary elements are used in "A Jury of Her Peers"?

"A Jury of Her Peers" is a reworking of Susan Glaspell's one-act play Trifles. Both works raise questions about whether the criminal justice system treats women fairly. In both, the men in law enforcement are searching for evidence that Minnie Wright murdered her husband.

Changing the play to a story allows Glaspell to make Mrs. Hale the point-of-view character. This offers access to her thoughts. From the start, Mrs. Hale feels sympathy for her friend, thinking about and understanding firsthand what it feels like to be a farm wife. Through Mrs. Hale's thoughts, the story builds sympathy for Minnie.

Glaspell's imagery also helps build a case for Mrs. Wright. Mrs. Hale, for example, describes Minnie's worn red rocker as lopsided and missing a slat. Only a miserly, hard-hearted husband, Mrs. Hale realizes, would force his wife to endure such a damaged chair. Likewise, Mrs. Hale notes that Minnie's black skirt is much worn and has been turned many times, a technique in which women would take all the seams out of a piece of clothing and resew it flipped, with the inner cloth on the outside. But Minnie has done this so many times that the skirt looks worn no matter what. These images shows us that Minnie has suffered from her husband's extreme frugality.

The dialogue of the men with and about the women also builds sympathy for a woman's plight. The men are belittling, for example, when Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters are dismayed over the loss of Minnie's preserves

"Oh, well," said Mrs. Hale's husband, with good-natured superiority, "women are used to worrying over trifles."

This dialogue shows that the men misunderstand how hard a farm woman works and have little empathy for a farm woman's life. They are not a jury of her peers.

What is the climax of "A Jury of Her Peers"?

The climax of Susan Glaspell's "A Jury of Her Peers," the moment of highest emotional intensity, occurs when Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale decide to hide the damning evidence of the dead bird.

Because of the remarks of the rather flippant county attorney and the chiming in by the other men, Mrs. Peters who is the wife of the sheriff, and Mrs. Hale who is a neighbor of the suspect, Minnie Foster, are rather resentful of the attitude that there are "just kitchen things" on the first floor. Other patronizing remarks such as Sheriff Peter's sarcasm about the women's being worried about Mrs. Foster's preserves also prompts the action of the climax.

In the course of looking around, Mrs. Hale finds a quilt that Minnie Foster was making which has neat stitching except for the last part that has erratic stitches. A perfectionist with regard to sewing, Mrs. Hale feels compelled to resew this part despite Mrs. Peters's fear that they should not touch things. Then, while Mrs. Peters looks for some paper with which to tie up the clothes and articles that Mrs. Foster has requested be brought to the jail, she finds a damaged bird cage whose one hinge has been pulled apart.

Their eyes met--startled, questioning, apprehensive. For a moment neither stirred or spoke.

Further, as Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale search in the kitchen cupboards for quilt pieces because of their decision to give the quilt to Mrs. Foster so that she can finish it, the women discover a pretty red box. Inside this box is something wrapped in a piece of silk. "It's the bird," Mrs. Peter whispers. "Somebody wrung its neck."

Clearly, the women have discovered subtle, but damning evidence regarding the murder of Mr. Foster. For, he was choked to death by a rope around his neck in the same fashion in which the poor bird has died. This bird's death has most likely been avenged by Mrs. Foster because it was the one thing in her desperate and lonely life that brought her any joy.

Soon after this discovery by the women left in the kitchen, the men descend the stairs. Once again, the county attorney jokes about the kitchen and its contents when the sheriff asks him if he needs to look through what Mrs. Peters has gathered to take to Mrs. Foster at the jail. In fact, it is with dramatic irony that the attorney facetiously replies, "I guess they're not very dangerous things the ladies have picked out."

Climax:

The county attorney's remarks precipitate the climax of the story:
After the attorney and the sheriff leave the kitchen to examine the windows and Mr. Hale goes out to tend the horses who have been waiting in the cold, the tension of the thoughts and emotions between Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters is high as they look into each other's eyes, and Mrs. Hale turns her eyes to the red box. Mrs. Peters rushes to the box, covering it with the quilt; she tries to put it in her purse, but the purse is too small. At the sound of a door knob turning,

Martha Hale snatched the box from the sheriff's wife, and got it in the pocket of her big coat just as the sheriff and the country attorney came back into the kitchen.

Who is the narrator of "A Jury of Her Peers"?

The narrator in "A Jury of Her Peers" is cast as a third person omniscient voice.  The narrator gives an"objective" rendering of the facts, not speaking in any one person's voice, but speaking through all of their voices.  I think a case can be made that the narrator is Glaspell, herself.  Certainly, we can presume that Glaspell's time as a journalist in Iowa, the fact that she asserts that the play is based off of an actual case of a woman killing her husband in Iowa, and that she creates these characters reflecting social biases of the time can all attest to these facts.  The narrator tells us the story where we see men making disparaging comments about the women, and points it out to us, while omitting other details.  The story being presented here is one of a crime, but it also serves as social commentary as women, domesticated women, solve the crime, not the patriarchal elements of law enforcement.  We are not really told what gender the narrator is, but given the fact that the story does hold with it a focus for the empowerment of women and Glaspell's own relationship to the case with her background, we might not be too surprised if it turns out to be a woman narrating the story.

Who is the narrator of "A Jury of Her Peers"?

I was vaguely thinking of answering this question in a clever way by saying that Minnie Wright is the central character, even though she doesn't appear. However, I will go for the much more sensible answer of Martha Hale, who is the character that the story opens with. This is because it is Martha Hale who tells us more about the reality of Minnie Wright and her background, and how she changed being married to John Wright and suffering the isolation and loneliness that was part of her life. Note her comment on John Wright as a character:

"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. Just to pass the time of day with him--." She stopped, shivered a little. "Like a raw wind that gets to the bone." Her eye fell upon the cage on the table before her, and she added, almost bitterly: "I should think she would've wanted a bird!"

Martha is important because of the way that she allows us to have a much fuller picture of the Wrights and the way that Minnie was transformed. Note also that she is the character who begins to remove any trace of evidence that could possibly be used to indicate that Minnie Wright was disturbed or suffering anxiety. This can be seen in the way that she re-sews the bad sewing that Minnie Wright did that was in such contrast to the rest of her neat sewing. Martha Hale therefore is the most important character because it is she that is used as the primary vehicle for expressing the theme of female solidarity and it is she that influences Mrs. Peters.

Who is the narrator of "A Jury of Her Peers"?

The central character in Susan Glaspell's story “A Jury of Her Peers” is Mrs. Martha Hale. We see the events and hear the conversations through her point of view even though the story is told by a third-person narrator.

As the story opens, Mrs. Hale is grabbing for her scarf as she goes out the door. She doesn't like to leave in the middle of her work, but Mrs. Peters has requested that she come along. After all, they are going to the scene of a murder, and Mrs. Peters needs the support of another woman. As Mrs. Hale gets into the buggy, she observes Mrs. Peters, who is sitting beside her. Little does Mrs. Hale know that the two women are about to embark on something of an adventure.

Mrs. Hale continues to reflect on the events as they unfold. She has difficulty entering into the Wright home. She wishes that she would have gone over to visit Minnie more often, and she recalls the kind of person Minnie had been before her marriage.

While the men pursue their own investigation, Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters logically and intuitively determine what really happened to Minnie Wright and why she likely killed her husband. They pay close attention to all the little things around the house that are important to women and that reveal Minnie's state of mind. Minnie's stitching, for instance, is uneven. The kitchen stove is broken. And of course, the women find the broken birdcage and the dead canary. They then understand the difficult, lonely life of abuse that Minnie Wright has been leading.

Mrs. Hale continues to reflect throughout on how Minnie Wright has changed, and along with Mrs. Peters, she decides not to tell the men what they have found and deduced. The women understand what the men never will. At the end of the story, Mrs. Hale puts the box containing the dead canary into her pocket.

Who is the narrator of "A Jury of Her Peers"?

There are five characters who appear in the story: Sheriff Peters, and his wife; Lewis Hale, and his wife Martha; and Henderson, a county attorney. There are two further characters who are not actually present in the narrative. These two are John and Minnie Wright, neighbours of the Hales. Although they do not actually appear, they are at the very heart of the story. John’s murder is the central event and his wife has been apprehended as his apparent murderer. The four characters who are actually present in the narrative have the task of looking around the Wright house looking for clues as to the motive.

There is a clear-cut gender divide in this little group of people who assiduously search the Wright home. Sherriff Peters comes across as bluff and hearty, Lewis Hale more serious, and Henderson appears rather wry and sarcastic, but all three alike are dismissive of the women and their ability to materially assist in the investigation. They seem to have a dim view of women in general, believing them to be capable of little more than house-keeping and child-bearing. What they abjectly fail to realize is that the two women, in all likelihood hit upon the correct motive for the murder. For Martha and Mrs Peters are able to see the significance of apparently minor domestic details that the men cavalierly dismiss. To them, such feminine matters are simply not important whereas Minnie’s fellow-women recognize that such details lead right to the heart of the matter. From their careful examination of the house, allied to what they know and remember about the Wrights, they are able to build up a sobering picture of Minnie as a desperate and lonely individual who endured years of misery at the hands of her husband, by all accounts an utterly mean-spirited man, and was finally driven to murder him when he killed her canary, the only company she had.

Martha remembers Minnie from years back, fresh and lively and attractive, and is deeply grieved over the fact that this former bright girl came to be trapped in such a loveless, childless marriage, which crushed the spirit out of her. Martha is also consumed with guilt because, although she was a neighbour, she never made the time to go over and see her, and comfort her.

'Oh, I wish I’d come over here once in a while!' she cried. 'That was a crime! That was a crime! Who’s going to punish that?’

 However, although she gets emotional over the whole affair, Martha is no helpless, hand-wringing female On the contrary, she resolves to protect Minnie from the evidence that will surely convict her. If she was not able to help her before, she will do so now. Therefore she comes across as a strong, determined woman, willing to defy the men and the law. Mrs Peters appears altogether quieter and more timid, but she backs up her fellow-woman.

What are the main elements of "A Jury of Her Peers," including exposition, conflict, characters, and plot?

"A Jury of Her Peers" is a story within a story. The main story is the real-time saga of Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters unraveling the mystery of Mr. Wright's death while their husbands, following the traditional route of male law enforcement and legal professionals, are unable to figure it out. The inside story is the flashback story of Minnie Foster Wright, the abuse she endured at the hands of her husband, and the murder she committed in "self-defense." Each story has its own story arc. (The story of Minnie Foster will be represented in italics.)

Exposition: On a cold morning in March, Mrs. Hale travels to the country home of her neighbor, Mrs. Wright, to keep the sheriff's wife, Mrs. Peters, company as they investigate the scene of Mr. Wright's apparent murder. Minnie Foster, a sweet young woman who loves to sing, marries Mr. Wright and moves into his farmhouse.

Conflict: Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters must decide whether they will submit to the patriarchal system of "justice" and assist the sheriff and county attorney in solving the murder or whether they will be loyal to a fellow farm wife who has been abused by her husband and who had no way out, partly because of lack of support from her female neighbors. For both Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters, the conflict is "woman vs. herself." Minnie's conflict is with her abusive husband and a society that gives men control over women in day-to-day life as well as in the legal system.

Antagonist: For Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters, their own consciences, the sheriff, the county attorney, and the legal system are antagonists. For Minnie, her husband and a social system that ignore her needs and safety are the antagonists.

Protagonist: Mrs. Hale is the main protagonist of the real-time story. Minnie is the protagonist of the story that is being reconstructed.

Complications: When Mrs. Hale begins to feel guilty for not having kept in touch with Minnie, and when Mrs. Peters recalls a boy hatcheting her pet kitten to death, the choice of whether to reveal the evidence they've found gets complicated. For Minnie, things became more complicated when Mr. Wright killed her pet canary--she may have begun to literally fear for her own safety when she saw the anger and cruelty of the man she was married to.

Crisis: A crisis that precedes the climax and tilts Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peter toward withholding the evidence could be the attorney and sheriff's condescending jokes made about the women. These are enough to convince the women that Minnie will not receive a fair trial in the hands of a male-dominated legal system just as she did not have a fair chance at life in the hands of her husband. For Minnie, the crisis may have occurred in her mind as she sat sewing the quilt pieces together and weighing her options--deciding her only way out was to kill her husband.

Climax: In the real-time story, the climax occurs when Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale meet eyes, both deciding, without speaking, that they must conceal the dead bird. For Minnie, the climax is tightening the noose around her husband's neck. 

Conclusion: In the real-time story, the conclusion is that the men are unable to find a piece of evidence that will conclusively convict Mrs. Wright of murder. In Minnie's story, the conclusion is the same.

Who are the characters in "A Jury of her Peers"?

The famous short story "A Jury of Her Peers" by Susan Glaspell tells of a group of people investigating a murder in a remote Iowa farmhouse. The two main characters are Martha Hale, the wife of a local farmer, and Mrs. Peters, the wife of the sheriff. These are the peers that the story title mentions, because the accused murderer is another farmer's wife, Minnie Wright, who never actually appears in the story. While the men go about the house and grounds looking for clues, Martha Hale and Mrs. Peters, because of their empathy for Mrs. Wright and the similarity of their treatment as women, are able to piece together clues that suggest that Mrs. Wright did indeed commit the murder. However, as a jury of two, they decide that despite Mrs. Wright's probable guilt, they will not expose her by sharing the evidence they find. They seem to feel the homicide is justified due to the proof they discover of the dead man's ill treatment of her.

The men in the story are secondary characters that mainly serve to reinforce the way that women are habitually treated as inferiors in this region. They go about their business and periodically make passing remarks suggesting that women are suitable for little more than household duties. These characters include Lewis Hale, Martha Hale's husband, Sheriff Peters, Mrs. Peters' husband, and Henderson, the county attorney.

As mentioned above, Mr. and Mrs. Wright do not actually appear as direct characters in the story, but they are indirectly involved. John Wright is the abusive husband and murdered man. Mrs. Wright, whose name used to be Minnie Foster, is the woman accused of having committed the murder.

One other character is indirectly referred to in the story: Harry Hale, Mr. and Mrs. Hale's oldest son, who was with Mr. Hale when they found Mrs. Wright sitting in the kitchen and John Wright's dead body.

Who are the characters in "A Jury of her Peers"?

The characters are:

John and Minnie Wright: John's murder (his wife is the main suspect) is what sets the story in motion. Neither of them actually appear in the story.

Martha Hale: The only character to appear in the entire story, she is sympathetic to Minnie and helps conceal evidence.

Sheriff Peters: The lawman who wants to close the case and doesn't listen to the women in the story.

Peters' Wife: She is also sympathetic to Minnie Wright and helps Martha.

Lewis Hale: Considered the principal witness, he also misses clues as to what really happened.

George Henderson: He is the lawyer whose job it is to convict Mrs. Wright.

How do the character types in "A Jury of Her Peers" relate to the story's plot and structure?

Because Susan Glaspell's story "A Jury of Her Peers" has a definite feminist perspective, it is the women of the narrative who are the dynamic characters, while the men are either flat or stock characters.

Interestingly, Sheriff Peters is described as "particularly genial with the law-abiding as if to make it plain that he knew the difference between criminals and non-criminals." But Mrs. Hale realizes that this "pleasant and lively" man is going to the Wrights' house strictly "now as a sheriff." Thus, in this narrative, Sheriff Peters acts as a stock character, a stereotyped figure, as does the county attorney. Mr. Wright, who is dead and described by Mrs. Hale as a man who lacked warmth, is a static character, a character who remains the same from his introduction until the end. He was anti-social and cold, keeping his wife isolated by not installing a phone or taking her out. Mrs. Hale tells Mrs. Peters,

"He didn't drink, and kept his word as well as most, I guess, and paid his debt. But he was a hard man.... Just to pass the time of day with him.... Like a raw wind that gets to the bone."

Among the female characters, Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters are dynamic characters. So, too, is Minnie Wright, who changes from a happy, attractive young woman who sings in a choir and has friends to a lonely woman isolated on a farm with a "hard man." Mrs. Hale, her neighbor, remembers Minnie and the joy in life she once had. Mrs. Hale also realizes how significant the little songbird must have been to Minnie to have caused her to kill her husband for destroying it. She feels guilty for not having visited Mrs. Wright more often, knowing now how lonely the woman was.

Mrs. Peters, who is at first uncomfortable at the Wrights' house, talks with Mrs. Hale and learns about Mrs. Wright, whose once interesting life shared with others changed to one of isolation. As she listens, Mrs. Peters's sympathy for the woman increases. While she and Mrs. Hale wait for the men who have gone upstairs, they talk, and Mrs. Peters learns even more about Minnie. Her sympathy for the lonely woman grows. In fact, both women begin to sympathize with Mrs. Wright after they discover how cruel and cold Mr. Wright was. Later, they realize that his killing of the little songbird that they have discovered is monumental to Mrs. Wright because it has been the only beauty and joy she had in her lonely life. So, because they sympathize with Mrs. Wright, the two women take justice into their own hands by hiding the songbird with its broken neck—the only evidence that hints at Minnie's motive for killing Mr. Wright.

How do the character types in "A Jury of Her Peers" relate to the story's plot and structure?

The previous thoughts were strong.  I would offer another dimension to it which is kind of out there and will require a strong level of substantiation if you choose to pursue it.  The statement that Glaspell might be making with round and static characters might be based on gender.  The men in the play are shown to be relatively static throughout in their self- centered and dull ways. They lack the creativity and imagination to both solve the actual crime and expand their moral sense to incorporate the narrative of the women, their wives, into the discourse.  In contrast, the women are the most dynamic in both how they solve the crime and how they go about understanding their own voice as an act of almost resistance.  The looks they give one another upon their revelation of the solving of the crime might be a culmination of this dynamic chord where epiphany and understanding represent the true acknowledgment of voice.  It might be a good exercise to construct static and dynamic characters based on gender affiliation.

Who are the protagonist and antagonist in "A Jury of Her Peers"?

In Glaspell's short story "A Jury of Her Peers," the main conflict pits the men's arrogant air of superiority and seemingly logical methods against the women's responses to the conditions of Minnie Foster's life. Therefore, it would seem that the protagonists are the women and the antagonists the men.

As the sheriff, the county attorney, and the neighbor Mr. Hale go upstairs to the site of the murder where they search for clues, the sheriff's wife and Mrs. Hale remain in the kitchen, an area where, as the sheriff remarks, there are "[N]othing...but kitchen things." He deems the area not worth investigation. However, this logic proves to be wrong since the accused murderer, Mrs. Wright, spent much of her time in this kitchen.

While Mrs. Peters hangs up her coat, she notices a sewing basket and a quilt on which Mrs. Wright was working. The sewing, which has been very neat is, for some reason, quite erratic on one section."Why, it looks as if she didn't know what she was about!" Mrs. Peters exclaims. Mrs. Hale pulls out the bad stitches and makes them right. "What do you suppose she was so--nervous about?" Mrs. Peters asks her.

Having noticed a birdcage, Mrs. Peters then inquires if Mrs. Wright has owned a bird. Mrs. Hale tells her there was a man selling them who "came around" one time. "I should think she would've wanted a bird!" Mrs. Hale adds after recalling what a "hard man" Mr. Wright was. As a second thought, she suggests that Mrs. Peters take the quilt and some sewing materials to the jail for Mrs. Wright.

When Mrs. Peters looks for some paper and string to wrap the items, she discovers a pretty box that may have scraps for quilts in it. Instead, she finds a dead bird wrapped in a piece of silk. The two women stare at it pointedly. Mrs. Peters whispers, "Somebody wrung its neck." But, hearing a sound at the door, Mrs. Hale quickly hides the box under the quilt in the basket.

After Mr. Hale goes out to the horses and the sheriff and county attorney move to the other room, Mrs. Hale exclaims,

"Oh, I wish I'd come over here once in a while! ... That was a crime! Who's going to punish that?"

At the approach of the men, they hear the county attorney say,

"If there was some definite thing.... A thing that would connect up with this clumsy way of doing it!"

Mrs. Hale quickly grabs the box from under the sewing, and she shoves it into her coat pocket. The two women "held each other in a steady, burning look" of empathy.

Mrs. Wright has been found not guilty by "the jury of her peers." The protagonists have solved the problem and probably saved Mrs. Wright's life.

Who are the protagonist and antagonist in "A Jury of Her Peers"?

There are two interpretations that respond to your question.  In one reading, the absent, imprisoned Mrs. Minnie Foster is the protagonist for the meaning and action  revolve principally around her:  it is her story that her neighbors, Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale tell. She functions beyond herself as a character; she represents the women who figure out her story, because in many ways her life is theirs—which is why they understand it. The antagonist would be her dead husband, for it is he and all the forces of society—a patriarchal power structure—that he represents that repressed her to such a degree that she murdered him.  It could also be argued, however, that Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters are the protagonists, heroically protecting Mrs. Foster by figuring out the details of the murder. Their husbands would then be the antagonists because they function in direct opposition to them. Although these men appear so  inept in their actions and ideas that they are little match for the women. in the story, they nevertheless represent a power structure against which the women must contend.

Who was the killer in "A Jury of Her Peers" by Susan Glaspell?

“A Jury of her Peers” by Susan Glaspell is based on her one-act play Trifles. The story in both genres was based on an actual murder case that Glaspell reported on when she worked as a newspaper reporter covering trials.  The story takes place in about 1918 in rural America. 

The story covers a murder mystery.  A man is murdered in his bed at  home by tightening a rope around his throat.  According to his wife, she was in bed when he was murdered.  She heard nothing, and there were no other witnesses.

The victim was John Wright.  His neighbor Mr. Hale comes over to talk to him and discovers his wife sitting in the living room in her rocking chair.  She tells him about her husband being dead in his bed upstairs. Minnie Wright is charged with the murder and taken to jail. 

The next day the county attorney, Mr. and Mrs. Hale,  and Sheriff and Mrs. Peters come to the Wright’s home to investigate. The women have come to get things to take to Minnie to make her more comfortable in jail. 

The men go upstairs and occupy themselves with the rope and discussing the motives and crime. The women are left to look around the kitchen and living room.  Through their search, the women discover clues and the motive for the murder.

Clues:

• The shabby clothes which Minnie is forced to wear.  When she was a girl, she was well-dressed and pretty.
• The quilt which Minnie is making is sewn with perfect stitching.   Mrs. Hale discovers that the last few stitches are skewed and obviously done under some kind of duress. 
• The bird cage is found empty.  Mrs. Hale remembers a man who came around selling canaries.  Since the Wrights had no children, the silence around the house may have added to Minnie’s loneliness.
• The door of the cage is torn from its hinges.  Obviously, someone angrily ripped the door off.  The only possible way this happened was probably by John Wright.
• The bird is found in a pretty red box covered with a red cloth.  The bird’s neck is broken and appears to have been wrung by someone.  When the bird is found, the women are able to put the crime scene together and understand why John Wright was killed.

Mrs. Hale tells Mrs. Peters that John Wright was not a particularly nice man.  Apparently, he was hard working; but he was not someone anyone would want to spend much time with.

"He didn't drink, and kept his word as well as most, I guess, and paid his debts. But he was a hard man. Just to pass the time of day with him--." She stopped, shivered a little. "Like a raw wind that gets to the bone." Her eye fell upon the cage on the table before her, and she added, almost bitterly: "I should think she would've wanted a bird!"

Minnie had been a lovely, young girl who sang in the choir. Why had she changed so much?

The women came to the conclusion that Minnie had been lonely and the bird gave her company.  The noise annoyed John; he may have told her to keep the bird quiet.  When that did not happen, John took the situation into his own hands and tore the cage from Minnie, ripping open the cage door.  Then, he grabbed the bird and wrung its neck.  John Wright had pushed Minnie too far, and she sought revenge by killing him in a similar way to the bird’s death. 

The women choose not to give their information to the men who would never understand.  Remember the women were only good at trifles.

What literary element is prevalent in "A Jury of Her Peers"?

The primary literary element present in Susan Glaspell’s short story is irony. This quality refers to a disconnection or reversal between expectations and reality or to restricting information from some of the characters or the audience. This story uses situational irony, in which the reader’s expectations are reversed.

The irony in the story derives from the different ways of understanding people that the women and the men bring to the situation. Glaspell initially leads the reader to see the story as a mystery that Sheriff Peters and other men are trying to solve: who killed John Wright? Closely related to the question of the killer’s identity is that of their motive. The women have come to the Wrights’ home to help the widow, so it seems that their roles will be subordinated to those of the men.

While the mystery is resolved during the course of the story, it is not the male detectives who figure out the who or the why of the murder. Although they suspect Minnie, who has been arrested, they find no firm evidence that will prove their suspicion. Instead, the women, by examining items that do not immediately seem to constitute evidence, are able to analyze the psychological elements of the Wrights’ lives. They can see Minnie’s despair and growing rage in small signs such as a quilt or a birdcage, while the men dismiss their concerns as irrelevant.

What is the purpose of "A Jury of Her Peers"?

"A Jury of Her Peers" suggests that the male-run criminal justice system of the early twentieth century might have failed to deliver justice to women, not understanding the reality of their lives.

In this story, the men who arrive at the Wright farm to investigate John Wright's murder show no ability to empathize with a woman's existence. They ridicule the details of a farm woman's life as trivial. They dismiss Minnie's messy kitchen as a sign that she was a poor housekeeper, not as evidence of her deep emotional distress.

Only the two women, Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters, who are left alone in the kitchen while the men investigate elsewhere, are able to piece together the facts of the case, because only they understand what Minnie's life must have been like. They realize that after years of abuse and isolation, Minnie must have snapped after her husband killed her beloved canary. They implicitly recognize that, after suffering years of abuse, Minnie killed her husband as a way of trying to reclaim her own life.

Through showing how the male authorities belittle women's lives and women themselves, Glaspell raises concerns about a criminal justice system that puts men in charge of a woman's fate. Although Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters illegally suppress evidence in a murder case when they keep the dead canary from the men, Glaspell builds our sympathy and support for why they protect Minnie.

What is the central idea in "A Jury Of Her Peers"?

Susan Glaspell explores ideas about assumptions and perceptions, especially as related to issues of domestic abuse. Gender plays a central role in these topics. The male characters fail to see what is important because they believe in male superiority.

The characters who are seeking clues to Mr. Wright's death and those who try to help Mrs. Wright are operating from a very different set of assumptions. The sheriff, in particular, has fixed notions of what is important enough to pay attention to, which leads him to overlook details that might be critical. The men tend to look through a gender-biased lens and ignore, downplay, or even ridicule what the women perceive to be important.

The author implies, through the details that the two women notice, that Wright had inflicted verbal, emotional, and physical abuse on his wife. She further implies that he used attitudes of male dominance to justify his behavior.

What is the rising action in "A Jury of Her Peers"?

In any work of literature, the rising action comprises an event, or a series of minor events, that come together to move the action, the plot, forward.

In the story "A Jury of Her Peers", the event that sets off the story's dynamics occurs when the women, Ms. Hale and Mrs. Peters, start to find the so-called "trifles" that are actually evidence of the state of mind of Minnie Wright at the time of the commission of the murder of her husband.

Oh, well,' said Mrs. Hale's husband, with good-natured superiority, 'women are used to worrying over trifles.

The "trifles" which, according to the definition of the word, are assumed to be non-important things, are actually considerably important. For example, the frozen compote, shattered into pieces, is indicative of a woman who once could devote herself to canning and doing other household chores. The lack of care in keeping these projects together clearly show that something was going on in the household that rendered her unable to keep up.

"Her eyes made a slow, almost unwilling turn to the bucket of sugar and the half empty bag beside it. Things begun--and not finished."

The stitching is another sign of Minnie slowly losing her mind. It looks as frazzled as Minnie felt at the time. Finally, the dead canary is the final giveaway that Minnie's husband was terrorizing her to the point of making her snap.

Had the women not found these things, or made sense out of them, the proper conclusions would have never been drawn out of the behaviors that led Minnie to do what she did.

What genre is "A Jury of Her Peers"?

"A Jury of Her Peers" best fits into the mystery literary genre. The generating circumstance is the untimely and highly suspicious death of John Wright, who has been found dead in his bed with a rope around his neck. Minnie, his wife, claims that she always sleeps soundly and therefore hadn't awakened when the murderer had come in and killed her husband in his sleep.

As the sheriff and the county attorney investigate the Wright home for evidence that will likely implicate Minnie in her husband's death, the women are asked to stay behind and keep an eye out for evidence. Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale begin to construct the story of Minnie's life through the details in her home. The tone becomes increasingly tense as they realize that Minnie's clothes were threadbare and that her bird is dead, its head twisted sharply to the side. Mrs. Hale confesses that she never visited Minnie because John's temperament was cold and unsocial. These clues begin to build the backstory that Minnie has endured the abuses of her husband for twenty years.

The murder investigation reaches its climax when the county attorney returns just as the truth of Minnie's silent retribution becomes clear to Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale. For a moment, there is great uncertainty about where the loyalties of the women will fall—with the men, who seek to uphold the law, or with Minnie, whose pain will never be understood by a jury of twelve men.

The men are therefore unable to collect any evidence to definitively convict Minnie. She has been judged by a jury of her true peers—two women who understand her motives—who therefore justify her actions. The mystery is thereby resolved, and Minnie presumably goes free.

What argument was Susan Glaspell making in "A Jury of Her Peers"?

Although many possible arguments emerge in interpreting "A Jury of Her Peers," the fact that Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale intuit the motive for Mrs. Wright to kill her husband while the men miss all the illustrative details in the kitchen suggests that Glaspell believes women to be more intuitive and sympathetic than men. 

The nature of the circumstances that compelled Mrs. Wright to kill her husband build sympathy for the isolation and privation of poor rural women.  Her barely functional stove, rundown house, shabby clothes, and isolation are pitiable, and Mrs. Hale, and eventually Mrs. Peters, feel for Mrs. Wright. Their discovery of the murdered canary and what it must have meant to her is the tipping point as they suppress the evidence that could help to convict Mrs. Wright.

Because the story is called "A Jury of Her Peers," and Mrs. Wright's peers consider her "case" and find her homicide justifiable, it certainly can be read as a feminist story. The men are characterized as officious, oblivious, and ineffectual as "the law." 

What is the significance of the title "A Jury of her Peers"?

This is a good question...consider who her "peers" are.  In this time period, women were expected to be at home, keeping quietly busy with the household dynamics and child rearing.  When the men come to the Wright house to investigate Mr. Wright's death,  they are assumed to be her peers.  We also understand that Minnie Wright is facing charges of murdering her husband and that she will face an actual jury...probably also men.  As we continue to read, we notice that the men don't pay attention to certain things...the cracked fruit jars, the quilt pieces, the empty birdcage...they are all dismissed as "women's things"--more clearly, silly trifles that aren't important.  However, on closer reading, they are the ONLY things important in the story.  The women come to understand that Minnie most likely DID murder her unloving husband who took a happy girl who sang and was lovely to everyone and stuck her in a cold, isolated home away from her friends...and KILLED her bird.  The women quietly decide to hide the most damning evidence...the small canary's body wrapped in a special piece of cloth hidden in her sewing box...from the men.  Without it, Minnie probably won't be convicted.  Therefore the real peers are the women who come to pick up items Minnie has requested...most importantly, her apron, by which she now defines herself. 

Who is the most important character in "A Jury of Her Peers"?

I always like to go out on a limb with questions like this, because really, you can choose any character you want to as long as you can find evidence from the text to back up your conclusion. So I am going to argue that actually the most important person in this story is a character that we never actually meet, but we only hear about. John Wright is a character who dominates the entire short story with his iron will and strength, and of course in him we find the solution to the murder mystery that we are presented with.

Note the way in which he is described by Mrs. Hale:

"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. Just to pass the time of day with him--" She stopped, shivered a little. "Like a raw wind that gets to the bone."

It is thanks to her marriage with such a man that Mrs. Hale remembers Minnie Wright changing so dramatically, and her thought that Minnie would have wanted a bird to brighten up her home indicate the kind of oppressive regime that John Wright imposed on his wife. The subsequent discovery of the canary with its neck wrung is of course perfectly in keeping with the character of John Wright, and we can understand why John Wright is such a powerful symbol of harsh, repressive patriarchal authority and therefore the most important character in this excellent short story.

What is the background information on "A Jury of Her Peers"?

Born in Davenport, Iowa in 1882, Susan Glaspell became a journalist for the Des Moines News. In 1900 she was assigned to cover the trial of a farmer’s wife accused of murdering her husband while he slept by hacking him in the head with an ax. During her investigation of this murder and her reporting upon the details of the trial, Glaspell became intrigued with the pre-existing conditions of the accused wife, Margaret Hossack. 

The reporter learned that Mrs. Hossack had complained of her husband's abuse to neighbors, but was told to reconcile with her husband and return home. Other reports claimed that shortly before his murder, John Hossack has thrown hot tea on his wife's face.

On the night of the murder, Mrs. Hossack claimed that she had slept so soundly that night that she did not hear a thing. Oddly, too, the family dog did not bark as it normally would whenever someone or something came on the property. When the dog was examined after the murder, it was listless as though it had been given chloroform, the authorities reported. They also observed that John Hossack was fatally wounded on the side of his head and did not die immediately, living for hours before his death early in the morning.

Mrs. Hossack professed her innocence until she died; however, of note, is the fact that all nine of her children supported their mother before, during, and after the trial. This support is rather puzzling since some of the boys were sleeping in an adjoining room that an intruder would have had to walk through to get to the room where Mr. and Mrs. Hossack slept on the first floor of the house. When she was convicted and given a life sentence, Mrs. Hossack said,

Sheriff Hodson, tell my children not to weep for me. I am innocent of the horrible murder of my husband. Some day people will know I am not guilty of that terrible crime.

The Des Moines newspaper article on her trial concluded, 

It is universally believed at Indianola that if Mrs. Hossack did not murder her husband she knows who did.

This true incident on which the young reporter wrote fifteen years later became the basis for Glaspell’s short story ‘‘A Jury of Her Peers’’ and her one-act play Trifles.

What is the significance of the story "A Jury of Her Peers"?

There are multiple ways to address a story's significance.  A text can be evaluated from cultural, historical, literary, and even personal perspectives.

The significance of this story is often considered in terms of its concern with gender issues.  Frequently read as a feminist text, "Jury" examines the nuances of female space and communication.  When reading the story, it is useful to notice the details or "clues" that can be interpreted by the female characters.  Further, a reader might analyze the differences between the domestic space of women (so casually dismissed by the male characters) and the social/political space of men.  Who has the power?  What different kinds of power are there?  What, if any, subversion is happening in the text?

Another perspective may be to analyze the story in terms of its social and historical context.  Published in the early 20th century, "A Jury of Her Peers" replicates the larger questions about gender in the United States at that time.

What are the characters searching for in "A Jury of Her Peers"?

The male characters in "A Jury of Her Peers" arrive at the Wright farm to search for evidence that would reveal a reason for Minnie Wright to have killed her husband. As the county attorney says,

You know juries when it comes to women. If there was some definite thing. Something to show—something to make a story about.

Mrs. Peters has come along with her husband, the sheriff, to gather up some things for Minnie Wright to have in prison. Mrs. Hale has come to help and keep Mrs. Peters company. Ironically, it is the women who find the pieces of evidence, the dead canary and the broken door to the birdcage, that lead them to reconstruct the crime.

The men leave the kitchen, contemptuously thinking of it as a trivial woman's place and one Mrs. Wright did not take good care of. The women know from the start that Mrs. Wright is not simply a poor housekeeper and that her kitchen disarray is a sign she was very upset. They then find the dead canary, carefully wrapped up and placed in a box. They see, too, that the door of the canary's cage is broken. From this they realize that Mr. Wright, a grim, unpleasant man, must have killed the canary in a fit of rage, breaking its neck. Mrs. Wright, they realize, retaliated by hanging her husband, breaking his neck.