ACT I Practice Quiz — Trifles
by Susan Glaspell — tap or click to flip
Practice Quiz: ACT I
Why do the County Attorney, Sheriff, and Mr. Hale visit the Wright farmhouse?
They are investigating the murder of John Wright, who was found strangled with a rope around his neck in his bed the previous day.
How did Hale discover that John Wright was dead?
Hale came to ask Wright about sharing a party telephone. Mrs. Wright told him John was dead, saying "He died of a rope round his neck," and pointed upstairs where Hale found the body.
What was Mrs. Wright doing when Hale arrived at the farmhouse?
She was sitting in her rocking chair, rocking back and forth, and pleating her apron. She appeared unconcerned and did not invite Hale in or react emotionally.
What do the women discover about Mrs. Wright’s quilt stitching?
Most of the quilting is neat and even, but one block has wild, erratic stitching, suggesting a sudden emotional disturbance in Minnie Wright.
What do the women find inside the fancy box in the sewing basket?
They find a dead canary wrapped in a piece of silk. Its neck has been wrung.
How do the women conceal the evidence at the end of the play?
Mrs. Peters tries to hide the box in her bag but it is too big. Mrs. Hale snatches the box with the dead bird and puts it in the pocket of her large coat.
What is the last line of the play, and why is it significant?
Mrs. Hale says, "We call it—knot it, Mr. Henderson." The word "knot" carries a double meaning, referring to quilting technique and the knotted rope used to kill John Wright.
Who is Minnie Foster, and why is that name important?
Minnie Foster is Mrs. Wright’s maiden name. Mrs. Hale uses it to recall the lively, singing young woman Minnie was before her marriage to the cold, domineering John Wright.
How does Mrs. Hale describe John Wright’s personality?
She says he was "a hard man" and compares him to "a raw wind that gets to the bone." She acknowledges he did not drink and paid his debts, but implies he was emotionally cold and controlling.
How does Mrs. Peters change over the course of the play?
She begins as a dutiful sheriff’s wife who insists "the law is the law," but gradually empathizes with Minnie Wright’s suffering and ultimately helps conceal the evidence.
What role does the County Attorney play in the investigation?
He leads the official investigation, searching for a motive. He is condescending toward the women and dismisses kitchen details as unimportant, which causes him to miss the crucial evidence.
Why does Mrs. Hale feel guilty about Minnie Wright?
She regrets not having visited Minnie for over a year, knowing the house was lonely and cheerless. She says, "I might have known she needed help!" and calls her own neglect "a crime."
How does the play explore the theme of gender inequality?
The men dismiss women’s domestic concerns as trivial "trifles," yet these very details reveal the murder motive. The play shows that the male-dominated legal system cannot understand a woman’s experience.
What does the play suggest about the difference between justice and law?
The women achieve a moral understanding of why Minnie acted as she did, choosing empathy over legal duty. The play suggests that true justice sometimes lies outside the formal legal system.
How does the theme of isolation manifest in the play?
The Wright farmhouse is set in a hollow where you cannot see the road. John Wright refused a telephone, and Minnie stopped socializing. Her isolation is both physical and emotional, contributing to her desperation.
What is the central dramatic irony in Trifles?
The men search the entire house for a motive and find nothing, while the women discover it in the kitchen through the very domestic details the men dismiss as insignificant trifles.
What does the broken birdcage symbolize?
The birdcage with its wrenched-open door symbolizes both Minnie’s domestic imprisonment in her marriage and the violent destruction of her last source of joy when John Wright killed the canary.
Why does Glaspell keep Minnie Wright offstage for the entire play?
By keeping Minnie absent, Glaspell forces the audience to reconstruct her identity through the objects she left behind and others’ memories, making the kitchen itself a form of silent testimony.
What does the word "trifles" mean as used in the play?
Trifles means things of little importance or value. In the play, Hale uses it dismissively when he says "women are used to worrying over trifles," but ironically these trifles hold the key evidence.
What does "red-up" mean when Mrs. Hale uses it?
Red-up is a regional dialect term meaning to tidy up or put in order. Mrs. Hale uses it when she hopes Minnie "had it a little more red-up up there" for the men’s inspection.
What is a "party telephone" as mentioned by Hale?
A party telephone was a shared telephone line used by multiple households in rural areas. Hale came to the Wright farm to convince John to share the cost of installing one.
Who says, "Well, women are used to worrying over trifles," and why is this line important?
Hale says this line dismissively after the women worry about Minnie’s frozen preserves. It is ironic because the women’s attention to these "trifles" leads them to discover the murder motive the men cannot find.
What is the significance of Mrs. Hale’s line, "I know how things can be—for women"?
This line expresses Mrs. Hale’s recognition of the shared hardships women face. It marks the moment she fully commits to solidarity with Minnie, understanding that their experiences are "all just a different kind of the same thing."
What does Mrs. Peters mean when she says, "I know what stillness is"?
She is connecting Minnie Wright’s lonely silence to her own experience of losing her first baby on the Dakota homestead. The line shows her deepening empathy and understanding of how isolation can devastate a person.