The play Our Town by Thornton Wilder is a play about the average American town. Thornton Wilder used three main situations to clearly relate the American Lifestyle in the early 1900s. This causes the readers to understand how the success of Our Town came to be through Thornton Wilder’s use of situations. Three situations that he describes in the play are a correct representation of an American town, relating to the average American family and the focus on characters rather than events. The first way that Thornton Wilder relates the American lifestyle is by clearly representing any small town in America.
In the lives of all humans there are always routines. People are born into a world where learning and growing are inevitable, constant parts of daily life. In the play, Our Town, Thornton Wilder shows how no matter where one lives, there is a way everyone can all connect. The production is split into three different parts. The first, showing daily life of a small town in New Hampshire called Grover’s Corners during the early 1900s.
He purposefully sets the town in the dull state of New Hampshire to illustrate how life continues to be the same year after year. Wilder criticizes this uneventfulness by scrutinizing the pull of the small town and compelling the audience to also do so. Wilder criticizes small town life throughout Our Town by analyzing the mundanity of rural life and the notable events of its residents and urges the audience to scrutinize the pull of a small town and speculate
In Our Town, Thornton Wilder arranges an empty stage to portray life in Grover’s Corner as a stereotypical American town, and he seeks to enlighten his audience on a more relevant aspect of the seemingly boring village in this way. Wilder puts emphasis in displaying an altogether normal community through the narration of the stage manager and the stage presentation to provide viewers with an understanding of the emotional complexity of a human’s life. For instance, in the beginning of act one, he sets a literal stage as an introduction into the setting of the story: “No curtain. No scenery. The audience, arriving, sees an empty stage in half-light.
In the book Our Town, it reveals the stages of two families’ lives and how quickly it progresses. To develop the theme of living life to the fullest, Wilder establishes a particular plot, uses literary devices, and implements tone. The introduction of two middle-class families, the Gibbs and the Webbs, is the dominant factor of the plot. These two families are most important to the play because the children, Emily Webb and George Gibbs get married. In act one, Wilder emphasizes on “social relationships rather than individual character”(Stephens 2) which enables his audienc to establish a deeper understanding between the two families.
Our Town Play Response Our Town takes place in the early 1900’s in the small town of Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire. Thornton Wilder, the play writer, is trying to show the importance of the little things in life. Throughout the opening two acts he builds up a scenario, which allows the third act of the play to show that we as humans sprint through life oblivious to what is actually happening around us. Wilder, throughout the play, tries to show our lives as something that we often take for granted. We, as humans, do not see what we have in life until it is often too late.
He uses irony and satiric elements to show how the society uses marriage as a tool for social status and class, the role of women in a society and the double life that people are forced to live by hiding their true identity. Parker's adaption of the play made it more adaptable to the modern cinema, which in a way took away from Wilde's original intentions of conveying the story by creating emotional connection to the
Thornton Wilder’s literary work, Our Town is an inspirational play that directly relates to the society that we live in today. Wilder uses central themes relevant in today’s civilization like Leria 8 community, time, and strong bonds. The Stage Manager sets the scene in a small close knit community in Grover’s Corner, New Hampshire. Where nearly every character in the story loves and appreciates where they come from. The play is assembled around several families that function in the routine of a simple life, such as the Webb’s and the Gibbs.
Then at the same time, George Gibbs chose a relationship with Emily over baseball and going to agriculture school. In the play Our Town, Thornton Wilder develops the idea that, when a character is trying to fulfill what he thinks is a hole, or flaw in his or her life, they try to fill that hole with something they greatly enjoy. Not everyone realizes, however, that the important things in life are things such as relationships, caring for others, and appreciating life. Simon Stimson was the organist at the church, as well as
Characterization is integral to literature. Though people read for setting, plot and a whole lot of other reasons, it is characterization that really draws in the reader. In Oscar Wilde’s novel The Picture of Dorian Gray, characterization plays a key role. Wilde spends ample time distinguishing his characters. No matter their role Wilde creates a personality that the reader can connect to, and can empathize with.