Susan Glaspell (1882-1948) was born in Davenport, Iowa, and graduated from Drake University in 1899. She lived in Chicago and later in Greenwich Village. She first became a reporter and then a freelance writer. Susan Glaspell wrote her best-known play, Trifles, in 1916 at a time when women were beginning to challenge their position as wives in society. Soon the drama Trifles is considered as a tragedy. I took the definition from the book Understanding Literature which taken based from Aristotle (384-322 B.C) thinking, he sums that “a tragedy is a drama treating a serious subject and involving persons of significance”. Moreover, according to him, “when the member of an audience sees a tragedy, they should feel both pity and fear because they recognize in themselves the potential for similar reactions”.
In addition, a tragedy can be related to the traits of tragic character. Aristotle once said that “A man cannot become a hero until he can see the root of his own downfall”. He described five of the specific characteristics of a tragic character, which are nobility or wisdom, Hamartia (error in judgment), Peripeteia (a reversal of fortune brought about because of the character’s Hamartia), Anagnorisis (the discovery or recognition that the reversal was brought about by the character’s own action), and Catharsis (the audience must feel pity and fear for the character). There are a lot of criteria that can be discussed in the drama Trifles. Thus, the criteria that makes Trifles a tragedy are in part of the physical action of Mrs. Peters and Mrs. Hale, the haunting play of Minnie Wright and the symbols that are used in the drama.
First and foremost, the...