Question

In at least one hundred words, discuss the use of imagination in Our Town. How is it integrated into the play, and why is it significant?

Answer 1

Thornton Wilder resorts to the audience's imagination in his non-traditional play "Our Town" because he uses a barren stage. However, Wilder sets the act scenes in such a way that the viewers can imagine that the setting is in a town and that trivial everyday scenes are performed. The elements from the stage that activate the audience's imagination are the roles played by the stage managers and the characters' own words. The stage managers are not ficticious ; they address the audience directly to link them with the actions in the play. The stage managers are unbound to time and place ,so the audience will have to imagine them. Then, the characters' words function as the audience's source of imagery. The writer's resort to imagination is significant because the viewers will have an active role in the interpretation of the play.They will feel directly involved in the issues developed in it: birth, marriage and death.