Glaspell, ''Trifles'' -- Jerz: EL150 (Intro to Literary Study)
"Oh, I wish I'd come over here once in a while! That was a crime![...]Who's going to punish that?"
I thought this quote was interesting because Mrs. Hale almost seems to blame herself for the murder because she didn't connect with her neighbor enough. The theme of this play really seems to be about how much small details matter to people. If we don't invest ourselves in seemingly unimportant things like visiting neighbors, we are as much responsible for their problems as anyone else. If you refuse to acknowledge the importance of the smaller details, like the sewing basket which turns out to have the dead canary, and only focus on the most obvious cold hard facts, like only observing the scene of the crime, then you are ineffectual. If we don't truly notice the intricacies of human behavior, it can be a matter of life or death.
Comments (2)
That's really interesting that you picked up on the importance of details. I hadn't thought of it that way. Mrs. Hale really does feel that she could have made a difference in Mrs. Wright's life, and somehow, she may have been able to prevent this from happening. One of my favorite lines in this play is when Mrs. Hale says, "We live close together and we live far apart. We all go through the same things--it's just all a different kind of the same thing."
Posted by Chera Pupi | January 26, 2007 8:32 PM
Posted on January 26, 2007 20:32
I agree. I kind of thought along those same lines, but I didn't really look that in-depth at it. It made me think about how the men spent the whole time making fun of the women for noticing all the "trifles," while they were looking for evidence that was right in front of their face, if they only would have payed closer attention to the details.
Posted by Bethany Bouchard | January 28, 2007 3:36 PM
Posted on January 28, 2007 15:36