Charlotte Chorpenning: Changing Children's Theatre Forever

Charlotte Chorpenning once said, “Fairy tales are the voices of long ago and far away, calling to the yearnings of today,” (Maes). All cultures and all countries are rich with stories of magic, mystery, and adventure; Chorpenning took these rich stories and put them on the stage for children. Passionate about children and teaching them, Charlotte Chorpenning served as the voice and writings of the children’s theatre world in the middle twentieth century by writing and adapting countless plays for children. Charlotte Chorpenning’s writings and adaptations of children’s plays have changed the world of children’s theatre by nearly doubling the repertoire for children’s theatre while continually portraying a traditional moral message in her plays.

Chorpenning’s experience with teaching and dealing with children helped form and influence her writings. Before she started to write and adapt children’s plays, Chorpenning was an English teacher in Minnesota, and she taught there until the early twenties. This is where she started to learn about children and find out what they liked and what would entertain them on the stage. She also directed children’s plays before she began writing them. She spent several years directing plays at the Goodman Theatre. This is where she realized that what she really wanted to do was write plays for children. Therefore, when she was sixty years old, she followed her dream and began to write for children.

Before Chorpenning started writing, there were very few children’s plays, which is one of the reasons that she was so interested in writing specifically for children. Before Chorpenning, there were only a handful of plays that catered specifically to children. By the time she died, she had double the...

... middle of paper ...

...other and father at the conclusion of the play (Martin). Chorpenning was devoted to making sure that people didn’t just watch plays, that they got something out of the experience of seeing them, especially the children. This is what drove her to write and adapt so many plays in her lifetime.

Charlotte Chorpenning impacted the world of children’s theatre by nearly doubling the number of plays that were available to children while always sending them a positive message. Teaching children for most of her life inspired Chorpenning to write plays for children and her plays were overall accepted by critics for their positive message that they convey. Without Charlotte Chorpenning, children’s theatre would not be the same as it is today. Without her contribution to children’s theatre repertoire, and her positive message, who knows where the theatre world would be now.