Glaspell employs metaphor and metonymy to use the domestic sphere of the home as a symbol for the mental state of the female characters. When Mrs. Hale examines the furniture in the Wright’s home, the narrator describes it as “dishevelled” and “unkempt.” This imagery underscores Minnie’s troubled psychological state within her unhappy marriage. Symbolism is further explored when the two women examine a broken bird cage in the kitchen. The violence suggested by the mangled door of the cage symbolizes John’s cruel, forceful control over his wife and foreshadows his death.
""I've never liked this place. Maybe because it's down in a hollow and you don't see the road...."See in text(Text of the Story)
Mrs. Hale’s description of the Wright home is telling. That the home is “down in a hollow” operates as a combination of metaphor and metonymy—a technique by which the object is compared to its surroundings. In this case, the home’s location in a hollow bespeaks the hollow quality of the home itself. There is an emotional hollowness and emptiness in the Wright home, as becomes increasingly clear as the story unfolds.
"The thought of Minnie Foster trying to bake in that oven—and the thought of her never going over to see Minnie Foster—...."See in text(Text of the Story)
Mrs. Wright’s oven is an example of synecdoche, a literary device in which a small detail metaphorically represents the greater whole which contains it. Here, the broken oven, with its rent lining, represents the entire Wright household and the home life of the Wrights. Like the oven, the household is broken, its lining—the relationship between Mr. and Mrs. Wright—irrevocably torn. Mrs. Wright’s years spent struggling with a broken oven is merely a metaphor for the years she spent struggling in a broken marriage.
"which the county attorney's disdainful push of the foot had deranged...."See in text(Text of the Story)
This is an interesting use of the pathetic fallacy—a technique by which an object is given human qualities or emotions. The attorney’s foot “had deranged” the cookware. “Deranged” literally means “disarranged,” thrown out of order. The word, however, is much more often used to mean “driven insane.” Thus, the phrase not only carries connotations of mental instability, but also of men driving women to such a state. By metonymy, the kicked cookware stands in for Mrs. Wright’s mental state.
"Harry was Mrs. Hale's oldest boy..."See in text(Text of the Story)
Notice that when the narrator interrupts with this exposition it is in the same narrative style in which Mr. Hale recounts his experience. This literary device keeps the audience engaged in the story while providing the opportunity for the narrator to fill them in on the events that happened before the beginning of the tale. This narrative technique also makes it unclear whether or not the narrator is summarizing Mr. Hale’s speech with this aside and thus makes Mr. Hale seem more ridiculous.
