Our Town
A Play in Three Acts
HarperCollins · Print & ebook · July 28, 2020
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- Who it’s for
- A spare, three-act drama turns everyday life toward questions of love, loss, and what we overlook.
- Themes
- Love, Life and death, Coming of age
- Genres
- American Plays, The Classics, Coming-of-Age
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Start with this bookAbout this book
“[Our Town] leaves us with a sense of blessing, and the unspoken but palpable command to achieve gratitude in what remains of our days on earth.” — The New Yorker Thornton Wilder’s Pulitzer Prize-winning drama of life in the mythical village of Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire—an allegorical representation of all life—is an American classic. It is the simple story of a love affair that asks timeless questions about the meaning of love, life, and death.
Continue reading
Our Town explores the relationship between two young neighbors, George Gibbs and Emily Webb, whose childhood friendship blossoms into romance, and then culminates in marriage. When Emily loses her life during childbirth, the circle of life portrayed in each of the three acts—childhood, adulthood, and death—is fully realized. Widely considered one of the greatest American plays of all time, Our Town debuted on Broadway in 1938 and continues to be performed daily on stages around the world. This special edition includes an afterword by Wilder's nephew, Tappan Wilder, with illuminating documentary material about the playwright and his most famous drama.
Ordinary Days, Larger Questions
A spare, three-act drama turns everyday life toward questions of love, loss, and what we overlook.
Come here for
- A love story framed by childhood, adulthood, and death
- Theater that invites reflection on life’s ordinary moments
Expect
- An American classic shaped as a play in three acts
- An edition with an afterword and documentary material
Where it sits
| American Plays | 95% |
|---|---|
| The Classics | 31% |
| Coming-of-Age | 21% |
Percentages are BookFrontier’s reading of the book.
Publisher categories
- American Plays
- Action & Adventure
- The Classics
- Family Sagas
Show all 8 publisher categories
- Literary Fiction
- Psychological Fiction
- Coming-of-Age
- Women's Fiction
- Authors
- Thornton Wilder
- Publisher
- HarperCollins
- Published
- July 28, 2020
- Format
- Print & ebook
- Theme
- Love · Life and death · Coming of age
- Reading lane
- American Plays