Our Town Play Themes

Our Town is quite possibly one of the most popular American plays ever written. The play consists of topics such as community, values of religion, family, and the simplest pleasures in life while using incredible innovative elements to perform this play. Such as minimal stage sets, The Stage Manager, who narrates and controls all the action, and characters that speak from beyond the grave. Thornton Wilder, the writer of Our Town, was the second child to Amos and Isabella Wilder. Thornton grew up in a highly educated and accomplished family. His father was a newspaper owner and editor as well as a successful public speaker. Thornton’s mother was a cultured, educated, incredible poet. They both instilled a love for classics and intellectual

He enrolled at Oberlin College but then transferred to Yale in 1917. Once the United States of America was pulled into World War I, Wilder bravely volunteered for 1st Coast Artillery in Rhode Island. Once the war was over, he obtained his bachelor’s degree from Yale and published his first play, The Trumpet Shall Sound. The play takes place in a simple small town in New England. I say simple due to the fact that we may become bored due to the similarity of our own lives. Once we witnessed events in the play that we may have formerly perceived as important and big events, are actually portrayed in this play as relatively simple and everyday occurrences, and we begin to question just how important these remarkable events are in our life. It’s not until Death that Emily, one of the characters, realizes how much of her life she ignored. After death, Emily sees how much everyone goes through life taking it for granted without noticing all the events that are occurring all the time. Wilder also shows us that even though time passes, our lives stay relatively the same. Thornton Wilder subtly uses these techniques to show us the important lesson of how we should live our lives. Our Town shows us that EVERYTHING in life is