“A Jury of Her Peers”, written by Susan Glaspell, is a beautiful story in which the writer proves that the female intelligence is not in any way inferior. Where man is blind, woman is capable of understanding things. Gaspell wrote the story based on an actual murder. This story is treated as one of the earliest feminist works, written by a writer who felt that women needed immediate emancipation from the cruel male domination. Therefore, the title of the story gains great importance. It highlights not only women’s intuitive power to arrive at correct judgment, but also exposes the pretensions of man. This paper is intended to make a brief critical look at the story from the feminist and gender points of view. The thrust here is to highlight how the writer through the character, Mrs. Wright, reveals her extreme anguish at man’s indifference towards woman.
Looking at the story from the point of view of Gender Criticism, it can be seen that the essence of the story is to reflect how badly women have been treated by men. Women seem to be born to suffer discrimination and humiliation in a patriarchal society. This is what strikes a sensitive reader. The story, in a way, is “a meditation on the nature of justice in a society where women are often denied justice” (Mike). The men in the story, knowingly or unknowingly, tease women many times during the investigation, and in one place Mr. Hale says, “Women are used to worry over trifles” (Susan). At another place, when the sheriff says that there is “Nothing here but kitchen things,” he is trying to identify silly things with the fair sex. These speeches represent what most men in those days wanted a woman to be. The Women were identified with kitchen, with domestic activities, related to the most unimportant works. Suspecting Mrs. Wright for various things and the searching of the kitchen by men for some evidence are symptoms of acute gender consciousness. It is a gender-specific way of seeing the world. The remarks coming from men throughout the story are disparaging. The language of “trifles” is a kind of feminine communication. Therefore, this story highlights the open discrimination shown towards women.
“Jury of her Peers”, viewed from the side of feminist criticism, stands as a commentary to the female oppression, female discrimination in social life, and it also stands as a feminist literary consciousness. It must also be remembered that the story was written when a woman was considered not fit to become a Judge: “there were not any women police officers, lawyers, judges, or jurors”, writes Plyler, a research student (Dean). The subplot in the story highlights this situation. The gender disparity in the society, prevailing as a result of historical distortions in man-woman relationship, and the psychological impact of these in Minnie narrated from the feminist angle is what “Jury of Peers” is. The noticeable change in Minnie is her decision to strangle the disparity represented by her husband. Woman is seen as a weaker sex in the male dominated world. Minnie in the story is shown as a domesticated animal. She is a caged bird. Her broken furniture, ragged clothing, etc, stand as symbols of her miserable life. She was badly treated by her husband. The two women in the investigating team discover, through the inanimate objects in the house, her broken life. They come to the conclusion that any woman in her place would have strangled her husband, as Minnie has done. She was like the bird which her husband killed. Once upon a time in her life she was always happy and free. She was very sociable, but the domestic life after her marriage made her an introvert.
The sheriff’s wife and Mrs. Hale could intuitively arrive at the possibilities of Minnie murdering her husband, mainly because there is a surrealistic experience common to all these women. “The two women stood there silent, above them the footsteps of the men who were looking for evidence against the woman who had worked in that kitchen” (Susan). Here the words like “women”, “silent”, and “kitchen” have female associations, as “above”, “footsteps”, and “looking” have masculine resonance. The word “stood” makes them arrested and passive, while the “footsteps” denote movements and activity. But the word “above” makes the attitude explicitly clear. It should be in this light the whole story should be seen. “The true conflict in the story is a sexual one, where the men insist on logic and masculine superiority, while the women judge Minnie from love and sympathy” (Review).
The story is written in the conversational style. It is dramatic. The writer takes the help of a few inanimate objects as symbols to identify the gender disparity. The association of gender instincts to these objects has been nurtured by tradition and culture in the society. The language carries certain hostile impulses, which have been streamlined by outlooks and habits; Mrs. Hale’s attempt to contradict her husband is to be taken as a symptom of impatience, which later on, took the shape of feminist movement. She tries to equal men, and this is exactly the hidden idea in the story.
Reference
Boedicker, Mike. “A Jury of Her Peers: Review”. Web.
Glaspell, Susan. “A Jury of Her Peers”. Plyler, Dean. Web.
““Susan Gaspell”: Review”. Web.