We discover this theme in Trifles, when a literal canary is found strangled and its dead body sewed in the pocket of a quilt—strangled by Mr. Wright and sewed away by Mrs. Wright, the same way Mrs. Wright’s spirit and free nature were discarded so she could serve her gender-assigned duties. Indeed, we actually see in her character a desire to serve those duties, a desire for children and to be a good wife through the descriptions we receive from Mrs. Hale, but these desires are denied by the cold, wintry spirit of one Mr. Wright. Mrs. Hale says as much to the County Attorney, Mr. Henderson, when she says she didn’t think a “place’d be any cheerfuller for John Wright’s being in it” (1051). And for the woman once known as Minnie Foster, it was