The Woman as "the Other" in Glaspell's Trifles, Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun and Kane's Blasted

Abstract

According to de Beauvoir, gender roles in society are in binary opposition: men are "the One", the absolute and essential, while the women are "the Other", the accidental and inferior. This concept of Otherness is clearly present in various elements of modern plays written by female playwrights in the twentieth century. This notion has been traced back in Susan Glaspell's Trifles through the play's setting and atmosphere, as well as the characters' understanding of "justice". For A Raisin in the Sun by the African American playwright Lorraine Hansberry, women experience the inferiority of being both women and black. Sarah Kane's Blasted, being an example of In-Yer-Face theatre, depicts the emotional and physical abuse of women in (post-) war societies through its harsh and brutal visualization of different forms of violence. By comparing these three different plays, it appears that there is a tendency emerging towards universalism, the "Other" is the experience of all women, at all times which is evident as the selected plays belong to different cultures across the twentieth century..