The Weight of Small Things
Susan Glaspell’s Suppressed Desires and Trifles
The Weight of Small Things
Some plays were written long ago, but they have never truly left the stage. Across different times and cultures, these works continue to speak to questions that feel familiar today: relationships, identity, freedom, social expectations, and the choices people make under pressure.
This staged reading series revisits classic short plays not as relics of the past, but as living conversations with the present. Through minimal staging and focused performance, we invite audiences to listen closely to the language, silence, tension, and humour that still resonate beneath everyday life.
The first reading, The Weight of Small Things, brings together Susan Glaspell’s Suppressed Desires and Trifles — two early modern one-act plays in conversation. One uses sharp satire to expose the absurdity of over-analysis; the other builds quiet tension around what is overlooked, unheard, and left unsaid.
About the Playwright — David Auburn
Susan Glaspell was an American playwright, novelist, and journalist, and a pioneering figure in early 20th-century feminist theatre. She is best known for Trifles, a landmark one-act play that reveals how women's experiences and perspectives are often overlooked within patriarchal systems, and for Suppressed Desires, a satirical comedy co-written with George Cram Cook.