Announcing the Completion of The HarperCollins Thornton Wilder Library

“From the earliest pages of his first novels and plays, Wilder examined the universal quandaries encapsulated in the questions the young man Pamphilus asks in The Woman of Andros: “How does one live? What does one do first?”

— PENELOPE NIVEN, FOREWORD TO THE CABALA AND THE WOMAN OF ANDROS

“One merely has to consider the central question raised by the novel, which, according to Wilder himself, was simply: ‘Is there a direction and meaning in the lives beyond the individual’s own will?’ It is perhaps the largest and most profoundly personal philosophical inquiry that we can undertake. It is the question that defines us as human beings.”

— RUSSELL BANKS, FOREWORD TO THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY

“For an American dramatist, all roads lead back to Thornton Wilder…THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH was a remarkable gift to an America entrenched in catastrophe, a tribute to the trait of human endurance.”

— – PAULA VOGEL, FOREWORD, THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH.

Wilder has brought to his characters the warmth that was totally lacking in the schoolbooks of Caesar and Shakespeare. and in his hero’s destruction there is true catharsis.

—The Atlantic

“An irresistible book!”

—The NY Times Book Review

“Loud, slap dash and uproarious … extraordinarily original and funny.”

— – THE NEW YORK TIMES

“[Wilder's] finest and most beautiful novel. . . . Spanning two continents and several generations, it begins as a murder mystery and goes on to tell a story, at once dramatic and philosophical, about the range of human courage, aspirations, steadfastness, weakness, defeat and victory.”

— New York Post

“If John Steinbeck’s mighty Grapes of Wrath is the tragic novel of the Great Depression, then Heaven’s My Destination is its comic masterpiece.”

—J.D. McClatchy

“Indeed the play’s success across cultural borders around the world attests to its being something much greater than an American play: it is a play that captures the universal experience of being alive.”

— DONALD MARGULIES IN THE FOREWORD TO OUR TOWN.

 The Thornton Wilder Library – a reprint of 10 novels and plays covering the full range of Wilder’s work is now complete with the new publication by HarperCollins of Wilder’s first and third novels, THE CABALA and THE WOMAN OF ANDROS in one volume, due in bookstores and online starting Tuesday, August 9.

The reissue of THE CABALA and THE  WOMAN OF ANDROS coincides with the 125th anniversary of Thornton Wilder’s birthday – titled WILDER 125—which is being celebrated throughout 2022 with a host of stage revivals and special events nationwide.  The August 9th release of the two novels is the culmination of a six-year cooperation with the Wilder family and HarperCollins. 

To date, the Wilder Library has added new editions of the plays OUR TOWN, THE SKIN OF OUR TEETH and THE MATCHMAKER (along with THE THREE PLAYS volume), and the novels, THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY, HEAVEN’S MY DESTINATION, THE IDES OF MARCH, THE EIGHTH DAY and THEOPHILUS NORTH.

Tappan Wilder notes that the completion of the Thornton Wilder Library is “the most important reprinting of these works,” adding that “the project included a review of existing ‘Forewords’ to each volume by Wilder’s fellow authors and playwrights.” The volumes also include fine-tuned, revised ‘Afterwords’ by Tappan Wilder, with his unique perspective into the elder Wilder’s life and career.

Featuring new covers, the Wilder Library releases are also available in Audio and E-book formats.

THE CABALA (1926) is the tale of a young American student who witnesses firsthand the decaying royalty in post-World War I Rome. An extraordinary succès d’estime hailed for style and vivid portraits, the novel opened the door for Wilder’s publishers to release THE BRIDGE OF SAN LUIS REY (1927) the following year, the staggering best-seller that changed Wilder’s life. THE WOMAN OF ANDROS (1930), is the primary source for Thornton Wilder’s most famous PLAY, OUR TOWN (1938). Set before the birth of Christ, THE WOMAN OF ANDROS depicts the harsh life of a hauntingly beautiful courtesan. Her telling in the novel of how the King of the Dead did Zeus a favor by returning a friend to life on a certain day in his 15th year is the first sighting of Emily Webb’s return after her death in Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire. 

Wilder’s novels and plays accounted for three Pulitzer Prizes, a National Book Award and, with a single exception, all the novels achieved bestseller status. His works range from Julius Caesar’s Rome in 44 B.C.E.(The Ides of March) to 17th century  Lima, Peru,  (The Bridge of San Luis Rey),  to  Emily Webb in  Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire, in 1900 (Our Town), to Theophilus North’s  Newport, Rhode Island, of the 1920s (Theophilus. North), to a murder in Coaltown, Illinois, in 1902 (The Eighth Day), Dolly Levi chasing a  husband  in Yonkers, New York, in the late 19th century (The Matchmaker), to a couple married for 5,000 years living in Excelsior, New Jersey, in the 20th century  (The Skin of Our Teeth),  to a  traveling salesman chasing perfection across the midwest and southwest during the Great Depression (Heaven's My Destination). 

"There is something for everybody in Thornton Wilder,” said Tappan Wilder. “My uncle, a born storyteller, combined  his immense knowledge of the classics, religious traditions and the literary and dramatic record down through the ages with stories  inspired  by his own trials, tribulations, and dreams and those of people whom he met across a lifetime of travel and observation.  He did so in a myriad of written and dramatic forms that explored the cosmic in the commonplace of everyday existence. On page or stage, he tried to speak for all of us and to each of us.”

Thornton Wilder was born in 1897 and died in 1975.  He remains one of the world’s most revered authors and widely produced playwrights.