Gender Unit: A Jury of Her Peers

"A Jury of Her Peers"
Susan Glaspell

Mrs. Wright almost certainly strangled her husband in the night, yet characters and perhaps the reader feel sympathy for her.  In fact, the women who visit her house before her trial with the sheriff uncover the extenuating circumstances surrounding the murder.  Moreover, the situational irony of the men's prejudices against the women's ability to solve a murder case hints at the unhappiness of women married to misogynists.

The entire purpose of the visit to the Wright residence was for the men to gather evidence that would ensure Mrs. Wright's conviction.  The women only tagged along to collect a few of Mrs. Wright's household possessions and provide support for each other in the scary crime scene.  The mere of idea that the women could provide some insight relevant to the case would be greeted with disbelief by the men: "'But would the women know a clue if they did come upon it?'" (Glaspell, 413).  The men provide ample reason for the readers to feel sympathy for the wives.

However, the women prove their husbands and the lawyer utterly wrong.  Not only did they find evidence pointing to possible motives for the murder, they almost completely solved the mystery surrounding the motives.  Using their experiences as housewives, Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters found several indicators of an unhappy home: unfinished chores, a tattered quilt, and a dead bird.  Eventually, the investigators surmise that Mr. Wright's murder of the bird, the only source of cheerful song and life in the house, finally pushed Mrs. wright over the edge.  Instead of barring them from any meaningful discoveries, being women was almost the prerequisite for solving the mystery.

Silent homes, ignorantly insulting husbands, and a doting patriarchy conspire to put men on trial instead of Mrs. Wright in this story.