be more appropriate to see the woman enter first with the man holding the door. We (the reader) come to the conclusion that the weather outside is very cold because of the fact that the men enter the room wearing heavy overcoats and go over to the stove to warm up. I believe that the cold, harsh weather outside the house was symbolic of the climate and atmosphere on the inside of the house over the past few years. The way in which Mr. and Mrs. Wright’s relationship was described gave me an icy, sickening feeling. I could not imagine living my life in the same situation as Mrs. Wright. A lot of important information can be gathered from the very first paragraph of the play. As you read on, you are able to see more pertinent details revealed through the characters actions, without the use of dialogue.While Mr. Hale describes the events that took place the day prior, he tells about coming into the house and finding Mrs. Wright in her rocking chair and pleating her apron. Even today, the rocking chair gives people a certain sense of comfort. Just the motion of rocking back and forth will calm most people, beginning in infancy. On the other hand, the fact that she was pleating her apron could imply that she was nervous and looking for comfort. As the play progresses, we see a fancy box; probably the only cheerful thing that can be seen in the setting. The box is obviously very important to Mrs. Wright. We also discover that the box contains a dead bird. The reader can conclude this because of the actions taken by Mrs. Hale and Mrs. Peters. When the box was opened one of the ladies “suddenly puts her hand to her nose,”(Roberts and Jacobs, pg. 1157) usually this implies disgust or shock. Usually when something dies it begins to give off a foul odor. The bird was wrapped in silk, showing that Mrs. Wright thought a lot of the bird. Mrs. Wright is compared to a bird during the play as” real sweet and pretty, but kind of...
