Author Question: What do we learn about the married life of the Wrights? By what means isthis knowledge revealed to ... (Read 37 times)

rosent76 · **on:** Jul 20, 2018

What do we learn about the married life of the Wrights? By what means isthis knowledge revealed to us?

What will be an ideal response?

Question 2

How does this play, first produced in 1916, show its age? In what waysdoes it seem still remarkably new?

What will be an ideal response?

Fayaz00962 · **Reply #1 on:** Jul 20, 2018

Answer to Question 1

From Mrs. Hales conversations with Mrs. Peters, we learn that over the course of her long, childless (and otherwise empty) marriage to John Wright, a once lively and hopeful young woman has been ground down into a haggard, careworn creature who avoided contact with her neighbors because her husbands stinginess and controlling nature made it impossible for her to interact with them with any sense of self-respect: Wright was close. I think maybe thats why she

kept so much to herself. She didnt even belong to the Ladies Aid. I suppose she felt she couldnt do her part, and then you dont enjoy things when you feel shabby. She used to wear pretty clothes and be lively, when she was Minnie Foster, one of the town girls singing in the choir. But thatoh, that was thirty years ago.

Answer to Question 2

Thanks to the telephone, radio, television, and the Internet, it is difficult to imagine a modern wife having to endure such total isolation as that experienced by Minnie Wright. It is equally difficult to imagine that the blatant, casual sexism and condescension of the County Attorney would issue from the mouth of a public official nowadayshe might very well think such things, but would probably feel hesitant to express them so openly. On the other hand, central elements of the play are still very much with us, including a social structure that undermines women and trivializes their concerns, widespread domestic abuse, and dilemmas regarding mitigation and justification in cases of this sort.