Welcome to the LitCharts study guide on Thornton Wilder's Our Town. Created by the original team behind SparkNotes, LitCharts are the world's best literature guides.
Our Town: Introduction
A concise biography of Thornton Wilder plus historical and literary context for Our Town.
Our Town: Plot Summary
A quick-reference summary: Our Town on a single page.
Our Town: Detailed Summary & Analysis
In-depth summary and analysis of every act of Our Town. Visual theme-tracking, too.
Our Town: Themes
Explanations, analysis, and visualizations of Our Town's themes.
Our Town: Quotes
Our Town's important quotes, sortable by theme, character, or act.
Our Town: Characters
Description, analysis, and timelines for Our Town's characters.
Our Town: Symbols
Explanations of Our Town's symbols, and tracking of where they appear.
Our Town: Theme Wheel
An interactive data visualization of Our Town's plot and themes.
Brief Biography of Thornton Wilder
The son of a newspaper editor, Thornton Wilder began writing plays at an early age. He attended Oberlin College before transferring to Yale University, where he graduated in 1920. After graduating, Wilder taught at a school in New Jersey while continuing to write. In 1927, he won the Pulitzer Prize for his novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey. He later won the Pulitzer Prize in drama twice, for his plays Our Town (1938) and The Skin of Our Teeth (1942). After serving in World War II, he held various teaching positions, including at Harvard. He continued to write and moved in social circles with various major figures in American literature of his time, such as Ernest Hemingway and Willa Cather. Wilder died in 1975, one of the most decorated twentieth-century American writers. His plays, especially Our Town, are often performed to this day.
Get the entire Our Town LitChart as a printable PDF.
Historical Context of Our Town
The play is firmly set in the beginning of the twentieth century. The play does not involve any major historical events, though the stage manager alludes to World War I when he describes the tragically early death of Joe Crowell in France.
Other Books Related to Our Town
None
Key Facts about Our Town
- Full Title: Our Town: A Play in Three Acts
- When Written: 1930s
- Where Written: United States
- When Published: 1938
- Literary Period: The play blends realism with modernism.
- Genre: Drama (the play does not fit any specific theater genre like comedy or tragedy)
- Setting: Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire, between 1899 and 1913
- Climax: In act three, the deceased Emily relives her twelfth birthday but finds it too painful and realizes that it is foolish to try to relive the past.
- Antagonist: There is no real antagonist in the play. All the characters live ordinary lives, struggling only against the normal passage of time that affects everyone.
- Point of View: Dramatic play
Extra Credit for Our Town
Not in Our Town. In 1946, the USSR banned a production of Our Town in East Berlin, because the play was deemed too depressing.
Stage Manager. Thornton Wilder himself played the stage manager in some productions of the play on Broadway.
