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Author Padlet

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https://www.learner.org/exhibits/literature/notread/author.html

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Susan Glaspell was born in 1882 in Davenport, Iowa. She graduated from Drake University and worked as a journalist on the staff of the Des Moines Daily News. When her stories began appearing in magazines such as Harper's and The Ladies' Home Journal, she gave up the newspaper business.

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http://vccslitonline.vccs.edu/Trifles/biography.htm

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Writers describe the world they know. (They imagine) a story to be happening in a place that is rooted in his or her mind. (Describing Setting) This is the case with Trifles. Susan Glaspell, in writing Trifles, drew from past or current experiences in writing her piece of literature.

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https://datausa.io/profile/geo/davenport-ia/

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http://norman.hrc.utexas.edu/bookshopdoor/signature.cfm?item=16#1

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George Cram Cook: The Greenwich Village Bookshop Door

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Identified individuals are represented by a biographical sketch, a list of connections to other signatures, and, in most cases, an artifact from the Ransom Centers collections. Help us identify more signatures by submitting your suggested identification.

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https://muse.jhu.edu/article/500710/pdf

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If you would like to authenticate using a different subscribed institution that supports Shibboleth authentication or have your own login and password to Project MUSE, click 'Authenticate'.

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http://1920womensrightsmonopoli.weebly.com/

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https://americanfiction.qwriting.qc.cuny.edu/files/2010/06/Trifles-Genesis.pdf

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https://edsitement.neh.gov/launchpad-jury-her-peers

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Launchpad: "A Jury of Her Peers," by Susan Glaspell | EDSITEment

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Thinking about the Story | Thinking with the Story

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=304nvr25LoI

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Trifles: A One Act Play by Susan Glaspell

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Student-directed one act play performed by Chapin High School drama club

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https://scribblingwomen.chass.ncsu.edu/

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Susan Glaspell came of age at the beginning of the twentieth century and was actually ahead of her time in embracing many of the liberal political causes and experimental literary movements that came to be a part of what is now known as the modernist period. Through her marriage to the radical George Cram Cook and their friendship with another Davenport resident, Floyd Dell, she became one of a group of early twentieth century intellectuals who questioned traditional definitions, particularly of marriage and women's roles in society. During the twenties, Floyd Dell was editor of the well-known socialist-leaning journal The Masses. Living near him in Greenwich Village, Glaspell and Cook were steeped in all the new movements of the age: socialism, Freud, unions, pacifism, birth control, women's right to vote. All these challenges to traditional society belonged to the group that Glaspell joined. Her participation as one of the leading lights of the Provincetown Players should have assured her a permanent place in literary history, as it did her male counterpart in this experimental venture, Eugene O'Neill. Yet until Trifles appeared in an anthology of women's writing in 1970, Glaspell, so well-known in her own time, had been totally forgotten. At first look, "A Jury of Her Peers" seems to have little to do with the innovative, often radical propositions that Glaspell's circle championed. Set in her childhood world of rural Iowa, the drama involves farm people who have no notion of the causes that shook Greenwich Village. The women's concerns are their preserves, their sewing, their children. The murder of a stalwart farmer by his reclusive wife sends shock waves, but it is a thing that everyone is sure can be explained. The surface level of the story, however, is exactly what the story itself critiques. If we look only through a traditional lens and only for evidence that fits our expectations, we miss reality, and we allow a false order to stand and judge for us.

Glaspell's play Trifles and the story made from it ask a "jury" of the murdering Minnie Wright to judge her, as peers, and finally to judge not her at all but an entrenched, male authority that long ago dismissed women's lives as "trifles." "A Jury of Her Peers" is about violence, a subject much on the minds of Glaspell's peers in 1916, with a war raging in Europe, with unrest among increasingly impoverished urban workers and increasingly victimized African Americans, with a host of new social problems accompanying urbanization and the change of the economy from rural to industrial. Minnie Wright's violence represents a very real threat to authority and official institutions. That her women peers judge her innocent, even justified, to the degree that they actively become her accomplices gives a sign of a revolution in the making. An interesting comparison to this story is Janie's trial in Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937). Here, too, a woman murdered her husband, her voice and self-preservation were figuratively if not literally her motive, and women provided a protective circle for the murderess. Glaspell's drama disappeared from American literature. By the 1940s, when new criticism began to dominate the creation of an American canon, the "trifles" of kitchen, home, and hearth were again just that, and anthologies were filled up with works that privileged the myths of escape, of the hero's quest, the hunt for whale and bear-myths that identified women with entrapment and constriction. "A Jury of Her Peers," we can note, actually fits the male myths of escape and freedom in its own quiet way. Here a woman's dreams, her need for liberty and voice, are thwarted in her home. If she were Huck Finn, or Ike McCaslin, or Ishmael, we would understand immediately. Glaspell is writing about how we read in gendered ways, understanding all too well, as her story shows, how reading through a masculinist set of values silences women's stories, as it silenced her own. A decade after Glaspell penned "A Jury of Her Peers," Hemingway would take up this question in the story "Hills Like White Elephants," which likewise critiques the incompatibility of men's and women's talk. His story has been in the canon ever since its writing. The importance of "A Jury of Her Peers" to the new feminist critical movement that gathered momentum in the late 1970s is reflected in the way that Annette Kolodny uses the story in her groundbreaking 1980 essay, "A Map for Rereading: Gender and the Interpretation of Literary Texts." Kolodny insists that what Glaspell gives us is "a fictive rendering of the dilemma of the woman writer." The author must, she says, "like Minnie Foster, be able to call upon a shared context with her audience; where she cannot, or dare not, she may revert to silence, to the imitation of male forms, or, like the narrator in 'The Yellow Wallpaper,' to total withdrawal and isolation into madness." Glaspell, like her character Minnie, shares with her audience the familiar context of women's and men's opposing spheres of power. There, we find the truth by learning how to hear, how to read, and how to respect the spaces where women's lives take place. In her groundbreaking study, In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women's Development (1970), Carol Gilligan makes several points that have a clear bearing on Glaspell's story. Indeed, Glaspell seems in this early work to define what In a Different Voice proved through psychological testing of young men's and women's thought and language processes. Gilligan discovered, for instance, that there are critical differences in men's and women's approaches to moral problem-solving that are reflected in their "voices." The differences, she stresses, "arise in a social context where factors of social status and power combine with reproductive biology to shape the experiences of males and females and the relations between the sexes." Women see the world and make decisions on the basis of relational thinking, in part because of their cultural experiences of interconnection and inequality. They see moral problems in terms of responsibilities, more than abstract principles of justice. Such differences abound in "A Jury of Her Peers" and raise the final important questions for a drama that is, as the title indicates, about how we judge and who are equals. An "ethic of justice," Gilligan concludes, involves both "fairness" and "care." When she says that "just as inequality adversely affects both parties in an unequal relationship, so too violence is destructive for everyone involved," she is voicing the realization that two women, as jury, reach as they try to judge their peer. -L.H.M.
Photograph courtesy of the Shelburne Museum, Inc.

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Susan Glaspell came of age at the beginning of the twentieth century and was actually ahead of her time in embracing many of the liberal political causes and experimental literary movements that came to be a part of what is now known as the modernist period.

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"Trifles is full of Midwestern color. Arthur E. Waterman delineates 'the Midwestern qualities of the play' as the following: 'With its precise realism, exact details, accurate dialogue, and conscious awareness of certain Midwestern ingredients, it is local color on stage' (145). The stage is very Midwestern: a gloomy kitchen, unwashed pans, unbaked bread, uncompleted work, an empty rocking chair, a plain table, and a stove that does not work. All of them represent the bleak, empty and closed geographical background of the Middle West."
http://homepage.ntu.edu.tw/~bcla/e_book/78/7808.pdf

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credit to http://salon.glenrose.net/default.asp?view=plink&id=8307

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https://padletuploads.blob.core.windows.net/prod/195200428/6de184567c81893f3ad5871763f813df/glaspell_article.pdf

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Critical context quote by Ken Jaworowski

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Critical context quote by Ken Jaworowski

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"“Trifles,” written by Susan Glaspell and first performed in 1916, has become a staple of theater studies. Though the play is celebrated as an early feminist drama, it stands on its own as an engrossing story. In the tale, two women, Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale, gradually uncover the motive for a murder, while their male counterparts are blinded by ignorance and insensitivity. The women examine the details — the trifles — of the suspect’s life to discover a deeper meaning and in the end solve a mystery by exposing a tragedy.

As performed here, “Trifles” is poignant and, occasionally, pretentious. Extended pauses have been inserted throughout, creating long silences;"
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/02/theater/reviews/02trifles.html

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http://www.history.com/topics/womens-history/19th-amendment

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The 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granted American women the right to vote, a right known as women's suffrage, and was ratified on August 18, 1920, ending almost a century of protest. In 1848 the movement for women's rights launched on a national level with the Seneca Falls Convention organized by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott. Following the convention, the demand for the vote became a centerpiece of the women's rights movement. Stanton and Mott, along with Susan B. Anthony and other activists, raised public awareness and lobbied the government to grant voting rights to women. After a lengthy battle, these groups finally emerged victorious with the passage of the 19th Amendment.

Women's Suffrage

During America's early history, women were denied some of the basic rights enjoyed by male citizens.

For example, married women couldn't own property and had no legal claim to any money they might earn, and no female had the right to vote. Women were expected to focus on housework and motherhood, not politics.

The campaign for women's suffrage was a small but growing movement in the decades before the Civil War. Starting in the 1820s, various reform groups proliferated across the U.S.-temperance leagues, the abolitionist movement, religious groups-and in a number of these, women played a prominent role.

Meanwhile, many American women were resisting the notion that the ideal woman was a pious, submissive wife and mother concerned exclusively with home and family. Combined, these factors contributed to a new way of thinking about what it meant to be a woman and a citizen in the United States.

Seneca Falls Convention

It was not until 1848 that the movement for women's rights began to organize at the national level.

In July of that year, reformers Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott organized the first women's rights convention at Seneca Falls, New York (where Stanton lived). More than 300 people-mostly women, but also some men-attended, including former African-American slave and activist Frederick Douglass.

In addition to their belief that women should be afforded better opportunities for education and employment, most of the delegates at the Seneca Falls Convention agreed that American women were autonomous individuals who deserved their own political identities.

Declaration of Sentiments

A group of delegates led by Stanton produced a "Declaration of Sentiments" document, modeled after the Declaration of Independence, which stated: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

What this meant, among other things, was that the delegates believed women should have the right to vote.

Following the convention, the idea of voting rights for women was mocked in the press and some delegates withdrew their support for the Declaration of Sentiments. Nonetheless, Stanton and Mott persisted-they went on to spearhead additional women's rights conferences and they were eventually joined in their advocacy work by Susan B. Anthony and other activists.

National Suffrage Groups Established

With the onset of the Civil War, the suffrage movement lost some momentum, as many women turned their attention to assisting in efforts related to the conflict between the states.

After the war, women's suffrage endured another setback, when the women's rights movement found itself divided over the issue of voting rights for black men. Stanton and some other suffrage leaders objected to the proposed 15th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which would give black men the right to vote, but failed to extend the same privilege to American women of any skin color.

In 1869, Stanton and Anthony formed the National Woman Suffrage Association (NWSA) with their eyes on a federal constitutional amendment that would grant women the right to vote.

That same year, abolitionists Lucy Stone and Henry Blackwell founded the American Woman Suffrage Association (AWSA); the group's leaders supported the 15th Amendment and feared it would not pass if it included voting rights for women. (The 15th Amendment was ratified in 1870.)

The AWSA believed women's enfranchisement could best be gained through amendments to individual state constitutions. Despite the divisions between the two organizations, there was a victory for voting rights in 1869 when the Wyoming Territory granted all female residents age 21 and older the right to vote. (When Wyoming was admitted to the Union in 1890, women's suffrage remained part of the state constitution.)

By 1878, the NWSA and the collective suffrage movement had gathered enough influence to lobby the U.S. Congress for a constitutional amendment. Congress responded by forming committees in the House of Representatives and the Senate to study and debate the issue. However, when the proposal finally reached the Senate floor in 1886, it was defeated.

Carrie Chapman Catt

In 1890, the NWSA and the AWSA merged to form the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA). The new organization's strategy was to lobby for women's voting rights on a state-by-state basis. Within six years, Colorado, Utah and Idaho adopted amendments to their state constitutions granting women the right to vote. In 1900, with Stanton and Anthony advancing in age, Carrie Chapman Catt stepped up to lead the NASWA.

The turn of the 20th century brought renewed momentum to the women's suffrage cause. Although the deaths of Stanton in 1902 and Anthony in 1906 appeared to be setbacks, the NASWA under the leadership of Catt achieved rolling successes for women's enfranchisement at state levels.

Between 1910 and 1918, the Alaska Territory, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota and Washington extended voting rights to women.

Also during this time, through the Equality League of Self-Supporting Women (later, the Women's Political Union), Stanton's daughter Harriot Stanton Blatch introduced parades, pickets and marches as means of calling attention to the cause. These tactics succeeded in raising awareness and led to unrest in Washington, D.C.

Did you know? Wyoming, the first state to grant voting rights to women, was also the first state to elect a female governor. Nellie Tayloe Ross (1876-1977) was elected governor of the Equality State-Wyoming's official nickname-in 1924. And from 1933 to 1953, she served as the first woman director of the U.S. Mint.

Protest and Progress

On the eve of the inauguration of President Woodrow Wilson in 1913, protesters thronged a massive suffrage parade in the nation's capital, and hundreds of women were injured. That same year, Alice Paul founded the Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage, which later became the National Woman's Party.

The organization staged numerous demonstrations and regularly picketed the White House, among other militant tactics. As a result of these actions, some group members were arrested and served jail time.

In 1918, President Wilson switched his stand on women's voting rights from objection to support through the influence of Catt, who had a less-combative style than Paul. Wilson also tied the proposed suffrage amendment to America's involvement in World War I and the increased role women had played in the war efforts.

When the amendment came up for vote, Wilson addressed the Senate in favor of suffrage. As reported in The New York Times on October 1, 1918, Wilson said, "I regard the extension of suffrage to women as vitally essential to the successful prosecution of the great war of humanity in which we are engaged."

However, despite Wilson's newfound support, the amendment proposal failed in the Senate by two votes. Another year passed before Congress took up the measure again.

The Final Struggle

On May 21, 1919, U.S. Representative James R. Mann, a Republican from Illinois and chairman of the Suffrage Committee, proposed the House resolution to approve the Susan Anthony Amendment granting women the right to vote. The measure passed the House 304 to 89-a full 42 votes above the required two-thirds majority.

Two weeks later, on June 4, 1919, the U.S. Senate passed the 19th Amendment by two votes over its two-thirds required majority, 56-25. The amendment was then sent to the states for ratification.

Within six days of the ratification cycle, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin each ratified the amendment. Kansas, New York and Ohio followed on June 16, 1919. By March of the following year, a total of 35 states had approved the amendment, one state shy of the two-thirds required for ratification.

Southern states were adamantly opposed to the amendment, however, and seven of them- Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, South Carolina and Virginia-had already rejected it before Tennessee's vote on August 18, 1920. It was up to Tennessee to tip the scale for woman suffrage.

The outlook appeared bleak, given the outcomes in other Southern states and given the position of Tennessee's state legislators in their 48-48 tie. The state's decision came down to 23-year-old Representative Harry T. Burn, a Republican from McMinn County, to cast the deciding vote.

Although Burn opposed the amendment, his mother convinced him to approve it. Mrs. Burn reportedly wrote to her son: "Don't forget to be a good boy and help Mrs. Catt put the 'rat' in ratification."

With Burn's vote, the 19th Amendment was fully ratified.

When Did Women Get the Right to Vote?

On August 26, 1920, the 19th Amendment was certified by U.S. Secretary of State Bainbridge Colby, and women finally achieved the long-sought right to vote throughout the United States.

On November 2 of that same year, more than 8 million women across the U.S. voted in elections for the first time.

It took over 60 years for the remaining 12 states to ratify the 19th Amendment. Mississippi was the last to do so, on March 22, 1984.

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The 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution granted American women the right to vote, a right known as women's suffrage, and was ratified on August 18, 1920, ending almost a century of protest. In 1848 the movement for women's rights launched on a national level with the Seneca Falls Convention organized by Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Lucretia Mott.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBAMcE-sHvM

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One-Act Play Collection 001 Librivox's One-Act Play Collection 001 includes one-act plays in the public domain read by a variety of LibriVox members.

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credit to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_suffrage_in_the_United_Kingdom

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"Trifles is not merely local color drama caught up in
the web of the first decades of twentieth-century American regionalism, but rather a
direct result of the tenets the American feminist movement was preaching at that moment. In this respect, Helene Keysar's description of the play as a work that 'reveals the complexities of women's lives and subverts assumed nolions of women's social powerlessness' (22) seems to be more operative to my purposes of analysis. On the other hand and following Gilbert and Gubar's definition, Trifles' dramatic effect on the audience rests on building our complicity with the women characters on stage
and, as such, the play presupposes a spectator actively involved with it. Paraphrasing Louise M. Rosenblatt's definition of a poem, Trifles is what the viewer lives through under the guidance of the text and experiences as relevant to that text." http://institucional.us.es/revistas/estudios/7/art_05.pdf