Psychoanalytical perspective Trifles by Susan Glaspell - Essay Example

Psychoanalytical and Feminist Perspective in ‘Trifles’ by Susan Glaspell. ‘Trifles’ (1916) by Susan Glaspell is a play about the innate psychoanalytical abilities of women and how they relate to other women through their common experiences and emotions. The two women in the scene (Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters) and the one who is physically absent (Minnie Wright) enact how the female world is bonded through common experiences of loss, anxiety, friendship, happiness, and unhappiness; and how they are able to analyze the psyches of each other.

Psychoanalysis is used intensively in criminal investigation and sometimes it proves to be more fruitful than the routine ways of investigation, as evident from this play. This is because a deeper understanding of human nature can reveal the motivation behind their actions. In this play, the playwright has employed trifles or everyday conversation or incidents to uncover the murder mystery of John Wright. Ironically, what seem trifles to the men folk, such as the quilt and how it was being quilted, was actually the key to solve the mystery.

It was of significant importance how it was being quilted because the women could see nervousness and anxiety in the last few stitches by Minnie Wright, which was altogether ignored by men as they were looking for physical evidences only.The dreary and queer ambience of the house arouses sympathy of the two women for Minnie Wright. The incomplete state of the household chores conveys an altogether different meaning than what the men believe that she did not have home-keeping skills. This is because the women associate with each other through their common interests in their womanly and homemaking activities, referred to as ‘trifles’ in the play.

Through their simple conservation, the playwright makes sure that the audience gets a hint that the three women are bonded together and understand each other’s psychologies through common experiences and feelings. There is an also an element of isolation and alienation from the mainstream life in the play. The Wrights used to live an isolated life- they were childless and did not have frequent visitors. According to Mrs. Hale, who didn’t think that “. a place’d be any cheerfuller for John Wright’s being in it.

”(Glaspell, 1916) The two women instinctually trace the underlying causes of alienation and its adverse affects on the life and psyche of Minnie Wright. Glaspell symbolically represents Minnie Wright as the ‘caged singing bird’. Mrs. Hale says, “I wonder how it would seem never to have had any children around. No, Wright wouldn’t like the bird- a thing that sang. She used to sing. He killed that too.” (Glaspell, 1916) The bird’s neck was also wrung in the same manner as that of Mr. Wright.“As Mrs.

Hale and Mrs. Peters understand the implication of the evidence they have found, they begin a quite struggle to decide what to do with it. Mrs. Peters, who is ‘married to the law,’ reaches her decision to acquit Minnie Wright through a series of insights into the parallels between her own life and Minnie Wright’s, including the loss of a child.” (Ben-Zvi, 2002, p.89)There are many conflicting aspects in the play- the male dominance and the female submissiveness; and the approaches to uncover the murder mystery by the men and the women.

The two women also face conflicting moments once they realize that they possess the murder-evidence; however, they silently resolve their conflict by hiding it and prove their loyalty to their female bondage. Mrs. Hale’s guilt of not having visited Minnie Wright’s home depicts the playwright’s feminist perspective that how important female companionship is for their emotional well being. The two women in the scene read the psyche of the absent woman by analyzing the objects and belongings in her house and their psychoanalysis of Mrs.

Wright is so profound that all pieces of the puzzle automatically fall in their places. ReferencesBen-Zvi, L. (Ed.). ( 2002). Susan Glaspell: Essays on her theatre and fiction. Michigan: University of Michigan Press. Hinz-Bode, K. (2006). Susan Glaspell and the anxiety of expression: Language and isolation in the plays. North Carolina: McFarland & Company.Glaspell, S. (1916) Trifles. http://www.vcu.edu/engweb/eng384/trifles.htm