Drama Criticism | Our Town, Thornton Wilder - Donald Haberman (essay date 1967)

Donald Haberman (essay date 1967)

SOURCE: Haberman, Donald. “Our Town as Allegory.” In Readings on Our Town, edited by Thomas Siebold, pp. 60-65. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2000.

[In the following essay, originally published in 1967, Haberman analyzes Our Town as an allegorical work in the manner of the medieval morality play Everyman.]

Characterization and narration, in Thornton Wilder's theater, are inextricably bound. The two are related not merely as a matter of being consistent to a single style; their unity and Wilder's use of it determine the style, for his practice is to give over psychological characterization in favor of an arbitrary and artificial arrangement of events.

In “Some Thoughts on Playwriting” Wilder defined his goals in characterization.

Imaginative narration—the invention of souls and destinies—is to a philosopher an all but indefensible activity.

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