Feminine Trifles

Crime stories offer a great opportunity to
observe gender confrontation in the issues of
identifying and interpreting facts, and the
questions of justice and morality. How women and men
interpret actual situations is influenced by their
learned behavioural patterns that subscribe to their
stereotypical roles defined by their social
realities, which inherently generates presumptions
and the imposition of pre-existing patterns on the
other gender. By examining Susan Glaspell s
Trifles,the works of Wilkie Collins and Agatha
Christie, and 21st century adaptations of Miss
Marple, it can be seen, that women and the concept
of trifles are linked in(detective literature. In
these crime stories female and effeminized
characters are associated with definite personal
characteristics, attitudes and behaviour, because of
gendered stereotypes and culturally ascribed roles.
Stereotypical gender differences are comprehensively
presented in these works, and they illustrate the
evolution of the concept of the female detective
triggered by the changes in stereotypical gender
roles.

Autorentext
Zsuzsanna Benko: Studied History of Art and English at Pázmány Péter Catholic University. PhD student of History of Art at Eötvös Loránd University.

Klappentext
Crime stories offer a great opportunity to observe gender confrontation in the issues of identifying and interpreting facts, and the questions of justice and morality. How women and men interpret actual situations is influenced by their learned behavioural patterns that subscribe to their stereotypical roles defined by their social realities, which inherently generates presumptions and the imposition of pre-existing patterns on the other gender. By examining Susan Glaspell's Trifles,the works of Wilkie Collins and Agatha Christie, and 21st century adaptations of Miss Marple, it can be seen, that women and the concept of trifles are linked in(detective literature. In these crime stories female and effeminized characters are associated with definite personal characteristics, attitudes and behaviour, because of gendered stereotypes and culturally ascribed roles. Stereotypical gender differences are comprehensively presented in these works, and they illustrate the evolution of the concept of the female detective triggered by the changes in stereotypical gender roles.