Maine Historical Society - Programs Podcast

Speaker: Penelope Niven; Recorded April 10, 2014 - Although Our Town , which turned 75 in 2013, was set in a small New Hampshire village and written in 1938, its universality has made it a favorite of theater companies and schools for decades. Wilder biographer Penelope Niven shares the story of his life (and his Maine ancestry), how Wilder came to write the play, and the special appeal of its themes of the passage of time and small-town life. Penelope Niven's 2012 biography of Wilder ( Thornton Wilder: A Life , Harper), was deemed “the best kind of literary biography” by the Washington Post. Niven, who passed away in 2014, was also the acclaimed author of Carl Sandburg: A Biography and Steichen: A Biography . She was the recipient of the North Carolina Award in Literature.