SOURCE: Papajewski, Helmut. “Our Town.” In Thornton Wilder, translated by John Conway, pp. 91-108. New York: Frederick Ungar, 1968.

In the following excerpt from a work originally published in German in 1961, Papajewski examines Our Town in the context of an American literary tradition focused on small-town life. Papajewski explores Wilder's adaptation of this literary archetype to theatrical production in Our Town.

Wilder's first major play appeared in 1938. He had occupied himself with the drama before that, but the results at most were tentative: one-act pieces that ran to just a few pages in length, and adaptations of foreign plays such as André Obey's Le Viol de Lucrèce.

Wilder's earlier attempts at drama had prompted in him reflections on literary theory. The plays of Obey offered many stimuli. The theatrical group to which Obey belonged, the Compagnie de Quinze, staged experimental plays in the years 1930 to 1936, and some of...