Discuss and/or compare the role of women in society in`Trifles`and `Death of salesman`

An Ameri give the axe womans life in the proterozoic 1900s when one-act wager Trifles was written by Susan Glaspell was a whole lot different than what it is today. During that time, women were expected to stay at home while their husbands go to work and garner a living for their families, a noble task which society deemed fit for men in as much as cleaning house, hanging enclothe, homework food, washing dishes, and taking c be of children were noble tasks meant for women. Women were educated, but the education or semblance of which merely served as a superficial credential to make them much attractive potential mates.Society was undoubtedly patriarchal, with wives submission to heir respective husbands taken both as the norm and the biblical good. (Mitchell 23) It was during this time that Glaspell wrote the play about a murder and that crimes subsequent solution through a series of trifles. Even at the start of her play, Glaspell showed the disparity of social class amidst me n and women. One example is the scene at the start of the play where the three male main characters enter the warm farmhouse first before the cardinal women do despite the fact that it was freezing cold outside.This signifies the priority that men assert of their needs oer the needs of their women. It also signifies a sense of women organism beholden to their men, the wives did not complain about the shabby treatment of their husbands of them in the scene, they considered it quite normal to wait until your husband enters a house before you yourself can do so. Another was one of the male characters constant mockeries of womanish concerns. That character, Mr. sound, trivialized the many details of the tasks that women in that era were responsible for by using the words women are used to worrying about trifles. By trifles, Mr.Hale meant the junior-grade, seemingly nonessential details that his wife and all other wives as can be concluded from his relish are always fussing over. He complains that his and Mr. Peters wives worries about unkempt state, pots, bread, and other kitchen items scattered about, about Mrs. Wrights preserves being frozen and cracked are of no significance to the problem at hand, which was the murder of Mr. Wright. Here we see that not only were women being expected to be obedient, to stay at home and do the chores, but they were being ridiculed by men for being careful and mindful of the very things that husbands expect their wives to do.Mr. Hale n eer takes into consideration that it is his wifes worries over the things that he considers as Triffles that lets him go home to a warm meal and a clean bed forevery single day, that gives him fresh, neatly ironed clothes every morning and not to mention a home cooked lunch. This mockery and ignorance show how little of a value society at that time genuinely placed on the tasks of a woman that it has expected of her. Another important detail that could be observed in the play was how women were indeed smarter than men gave them realisation for.The wives of the 2 main characters eventually solve the mystery of the murder where their husbands failed. The women do so through investigating the very same trifles that the men ridicule them for. Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale found the quilting that Mrs. Wright was working on, and takes note that the sudden change in the quality of the stitching may connote that something had happened that upset Mrs. Wright. They found a mixed-up bird cage and wondered if there was a bird, and then finally they found a small box upon looking for sewing supplies to take back to Mrs. Wright.The small box contained a bird with its neck wrung. The women put the clues together and decide not to tell their respective husbands, this last part somewhat connoting their preference to resist their husbands solid proof regarding the murder of Mr. Wright to which Mrs. Wright stood accused. The play portrayed the men as blind to the clues that the women we re able to find, this stressed the inequality between men and women even more, show that although women could be just as smart as or even smarter than their male counterparts, their roles in society were still below those of their husbands.The final aspect of the play that is connected with women at that time was the portrayal of Mrs. Wright. From the discussions among the other characters it was apparent that Mrs. Wright lived a stressful existence under the rule of her husband. Her husband was described as a difficult man, and the character of Mrs. Wright was implied to spend a penny endured years of abuse because of it. This last portrayal concretizes the marginalization of women during those times.It leaves to the viewers to connect the irony of how a woman who hadbeen subjected to years of debasement from a man who supposedly vowed to love and cherish her is in danger of suffering one last injustice, to be held intrial for the murder of the very man who had all in(p) the lif e out of her. Decades later since the first showing of Trifles in 1916, Arthur Miler wrote what would be later known as a classic of American Theater. Death Of A Salesman which was first shown in 1949 was not primarily about women, but about how one mans delusion and desperation caused the degradation of his family and his dignity.However, this mans wife who was the main female character in the play showed very vivid portrayals of whether the concept of woman had evolved. Lindas characterization in the play fares women no better than the women characters in Triffles. Linda Loman from Death Of A Salesman was yet another disheartened housewife who still kept fulfilling the usual tasks due to an American housewife. She is loving, condole with, understanding and ever obedient to her husband, Willy Loman who never fails to tell her to shut up whenever she puts a word out of line.Lindas insights and intelligence are a lot more that Willy is characterized as having, but her unfaltering de votion towards him prevented her from using her wits to save her family because she knew that such an act would rob her husband of the glory that in that era made men, men. The scenes that touch on private conversations with her sons showed Lindas brilliance and common sense, a common sense that diminishes in scenes of Linda speaking with her husband wherein she plays stupid with her responses usually limited to Yes expert. or what, Dear? . In conclusion, we say that both plays had feminist ideals embedded in them.Both plays portrayed the injustice being done to women and how these women of the past coped with such injustice. The time between the releases of these two plays connotes the period when these literature were written as struggling times for women. These years marked the birthing of a generation of women who would finally wise up and start to take their rightful place in society as mens equals. The plays were evidence that some women already knew what was happening, an d that these women were eager to spread the word of female liberalism which would later be known as feminism.These plays exposed that the treatment of women as housebound cleaners, babysitters, and cooks while at the same time failing to give right(a) recognition for these tasks and the women who did them was unacceptable. (Mitchell 85) The play showcased a womans abilities and strengths despite living in a mans world. It showed that a woman can and forget exceed a man if she chooses to. It scolds the women who have not yet awakened by portraying characters that resemble them. The battered and abused who are the Mrs. Wrights, and the smart, loving and caring yet neglected, unappreciated and frustrated Linda Lohans.These women represent those who cannot fight back, or those who think that what is being done to them is proper. These characters call out to those women and show them how pathetic theyve become in an attempt to jolt them out of it and make them take a stand. American wo men have come a long way since these two pieces of literature they have made countless others and are continuing to make them to date. They have gained much ground in their battle for rights and would do all that they can to push ever harder, reach ever higher, and make it ever clearer that no man has a right to make any woman feel that she is below him.