Trifles Analysis

The use of dramatic technique is always a great tool to master when explaining important details in a work of literature. Author Susan Glaspell is no exception to this rule. She uses her own dramatic technique in order to discuss the politics of gender, the unnoticed and repressed value of the role of women, the social and gender conventions in a male dominant society, freedom of speech, and the belief in woman's rights. The technique she uses is the impact of being invisible. The use of one invisible character serves well to this purpose in one of Glaspell's plays, Trifles. The invisible heroine controls the action and raises several important issues along the way. It forces the readers to be engaged more actively and to consider all the clues that the invisible heroine had left. In this case, the invisibility of the main protagonist helps Glaspell deal with the personal space of her female characters. In the play Trifles, her technique of the invisible character engages the reader and, at the same time, successfully communicates Glaspell’s ideas. Some of Susan Glaspell’s ideas relating to technique and storytelling also surface with modern works of film in the 21st century.
Susan Glaspell's Trifles is a play that tackles gender roles and the separate levels in which men and women think, and exposes the devaluing oppression and the mistreatment of women in the early 20th century America. On the bright side, the invisible character also explores sympathy and sisterhood in the light of a moral dilemma on approaching the truth. The action of the play revolves around solving the murder. What is unique about the play is that the key characters, Mr. and Mrs. Wright, never appear on the stage. Even though Mrs. Wright is not physically present in the play, her existence is felt and will prove to have an important role for the development of the action in the play. The quilt and the dirty dishes are the traces of the unfinished work of Mrs. Wright. All the other details

Cited: Griffith, Kelley. Writing Essays about Literature: A Guide and Style Sheet. Boston, MA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2011. Print.