Trifles is set in a small Midwestern town in the early twentieth century and was first performed in 1916. The action largely takes place in the kitchen of a rural farmhouse, the home of Minnie and John Wright.
The Wright's home is introduced as an unwelcoming place. Mrs. Hale, the couple's neighbor, states:
“I stayed away because it weren't cheerful [...]. I've never liked this place. Maybe because it's down in a hollow and you don't see it from the road. I dunno what it is but it's a lonesome place and always was.”
Though deceased, John Wright's cold personality infuses the home with a morbid and solitary atmosphere, adding to the unwelcoming and ominous nature of the overall setting.
The state of the kitchen is also used to denigrate Minnie’s character. In this way, the setting builds the audience's understanding of Minnie, who is being held in jail as a suspect and is thus absent from the scene. The kitchen is “gloomy,” shows signs of "incompleted work," has “dirty towels,” and is generally unkempt—a fact that the men remark on disapprovingly. Mrs Hale pushes back on the men's denigration of Minnie's housekeeping, remarking:
"Men's hands aren't always as clean as they could be."
Mrs. Hale believes that both Minnie and John Wright contributed to the general dirt and dysfunction of the home—an attitude that is mirrored in her belief that both individuals are to blame for the play's central tragedy.
Glaspell's play was inspired by the true story of the murder of John Hossack, a 59-year-old farmer. While working as a journalist for the Des Moines Daily News in 1900, Glaspell covered the murder and later fictionalized it in Trifles.
At the time of the play, women did not have the right to vote—the play was first staged in 1916, while the suffrage movement only gained momentum around 1920. The backdrop of turbulent gender dynamics and women's subjugation pervade the play, in which Glaspell explores how unequal domestic relationships can descend into violence.
