MGMT 2200 Critical Response to Trifles - Thinking of Masculine

Question 

A critique is an analysis of and a commentary on another piece of writing. It generally focuses on technique as well as on content. A critical response essay (or interpretive essay or review) has two missions: to summarize a source’s main idea and to respond to the source’s main ideas with reactions based on your synthesis. 

Answer

Critical Response to Trifles

The play “Trifles by Susan Glaspell is known to expose the traditional mind-set of the women in the year 1916. It is a play with unified plot. Men in this play showcase their present thinking of masculine dominated society where the women were not capable of doing anything by means of collecting the things which Minnie Wright required when she was imprisoned (Ben-Zvi). It is the work of the men to do analysis and investigation of the crime. It is to note that a victim of the homicide, who is Jon Wright, was found dead in his bedroom in upstairs. His neck was tied around with a rope and his body was throttled to demise while his spouse was in bed and her part portrayed her to be a very deep sleeper that she had no clue what happed. However, it is to state that the setting for the play, the bedroom as opposed to the kitchen, displays the archetypal male influenced and men controlled society and that the women in that society belong to kitchen. The other characters in the play comprise of Sheriff Peters and his neighbour, the country attorney, Minnie Wright and Mr and Mrs Hale. When the men of those time come in front of the scene, they give a dialogue of degrading commentary. With the same, the country attorney signifies Minnie for having dirty kitchen and then, Mr Hale states- Women were used to worry about the “trifles”. Such comments sweep the women altogether helping Minnie. When the women tend to move towards the kitchen, rebuilding and recreating the sad life of Minnie, they notice some notable things which the then men would not think of much importance. However, As per Makowsky, Mrs Peters in the play symbolises a women who attempts to notice everything from intellectual point of view (Gomes). According to Hernando-Real, being a dynamic character, her feelings become more engaged along with her logic. Notwithstanding of the replicated belief that women should obey the law, it is realised by Mrs Peters that not all things are black and white. By means of viewing Mrs Hale, the audience of the play think that Jon Wright was a very strong and strict man. The climax of Trifles unfolds as the women find empty birdcage with broken hinge. After marring Minnie, he even changed her. Minnie could not go anywhere and they had no children as well. There was an empty bird cage sitting in a closet with a box holding a bird with its neck distorted. Seeing it, the women realised that the bird symbolise the married life of Minnie. As per Noh, the questioning that Glaspell provokes in this play is not necessarily only about the roles of women in society but instead, how the perspective and knowledge are valued and are devalued within the particular contexts.

It is to note that the play “Trifles” reflects the preoccupation of the author with the culture bound notions of sex and gender roles. The title itself suggests that the trouble of women are highly considered to be mere trifles and invaluable which bear very little or absolutely no importance or value to the true work of the world- the world that is being carried out by the men.

Work cited:

Ben-Zvi, Linda. "“A Different Kind of the Same Thing”: The Early One-Act Plays of Susan Glaspell and JM Synge." The Eugene O'Neill Review 39.1 (2018): 33-47.

Gomes, Elisabete Pinto. "Between the theatre and the classroom: from Trifles to A Jury of Her Peers by Susan Glaspell." e-Teals: an e-journal of Teacher Education and Applied Language Studies 3 (2018): 57-75.

Hernando-Real, Noelia. "An Exorcism on The Outside, or Looking into Trifles—Before Breakfast: Geopathic Crises in the Plays of Eugene O'Neill and Susan Glaspell." The Eugene O'Neill Review 38.1-2 (2017): 74-92.

Makowsky, Veronica. "Susan Glaspell's Poetics and Politics of Rebellion by Emeline Jouve." Comparative Drama 51.3 (2017): 421-423.

Noh, Aegyung. "Susan Glaspell's Poetics and Politics of Rebellion by Emeline Jouve." Theatre Journal 70.2 (2018): 264-265.