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Setting
Style
Explanation and Analysis:
Trifles, which was first produced in 1916, belongs to the literary realism movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The action of the drama is revealed through the characters' conversations, and the plot is driven by their exchanges:
Country Attorney: Ah, loyal to your sex I see. But you and Wright were neighbors. I suppose you were friends as well?
Mrs Hale: I've not seen much of her of late years. I've not been in this house—it's more than a year.
As seen here, the dialogue is natural and realistic. The characters employ filler words and convey their thoughts without flowery prose or soliloquy. The characters' dialogue also displays their regional dialect:
"How do, Mrs. Wright, it's cold ain't it?"
This line demonstrates Glaspell's use of unusual syntax ("How do" instead of "how do you do") and contractions such as "ain't" to depict a midwestern dialect. This realistic, dialogic style allows the audience to interpret the characters through their own words and limits the audience's understanding of the mystery to what the characters discover in real time.
Glaspell uses simple, straightforward language to depict the events of the play, which is written in short, declarative sentences with very little exposition. This use of direct language transports us to the Wright's kitchen and allows the play to move quickly and cover significant ground despite its short length.
The play's style also mirrors the lives of the people it depicts; life on a farm in a rural community is similarly direct and simple, and the stripped-down language serves to highlight the setting and context in which the play takes place.
