It tackles topics concerning masculinity and femininity, such as gender roles within a marriage and what it means to be a female artist in a patriarchal atmosphere.
[2] According to dramaturgical scholars, it is "Crothers' most complex and pessimistic exploration of feminism's impact on society".
[5] The argument is put to rest abruptly when their underage daughter announces that she is engaged and Anne makes the choice, albeit reluctantly, to care for her.
Because it lacks a sense of poetic justice and the woman does not ultimately succeed, Crothers was heavily criticized for this play's ending.
Ann believes that the only way to prevent this marriage is to give up her own sculpture to spend more time with her daughter, asking Tom to make her frieze for her.
She falls under the category of the "New Woman", a personified metaphor for the changes in social behavior of women of the time.
The New Woman was "the social reformer in the settlement house, the factory worker, the telephone operator…all those women learning to openly question authority that neither included nor heed her".
[8] At the time, feminism was known as the suffrage movement, and the common goal of the suffragettes was attaining the right to vote.