Sam Shepard by David J. DeRose, and: Sam Shepard by Martin Tucker

Field: Arts and Humanities (Social Sciences)

Lohf and Sheehy bibliography, as well as subsequent supplemental lists, to produce what will no doubt be the primary Norris bibliography for at least the next thirty years.£ r i c HEYNE University ofAlaska Fairbanks 178 Western American Literature tf/illa Cather: Stories, Poems, and Other Writings. Edited by Sharon O ’Brien. (New York: The Library of America, 1992. 1039 pages, $35.00.) To read Cather’s Stories, Poems, and Other Writings makes for sheer pleasure, and the book provides an excellent scholarly tool as well. It offers Cather’s stories in chronological order from 1892-1929. Selected reviews and essays also appear in chronological order from 1895-1940. Included are two novellas, Alexander’ s Bridge and My Mortal Enemy; three short story collections, Youth and the Bright Medusa, Obscure Destinies, and The Old Beauty and Others; a poetry collection, April Twilights and Other Poems; a collection of nonfiction sketches, Not UnderForty, and selected reviews, essays, and uncollected stories. Cather series editor Sharon O ’Brien presents detailed text notes at the end of the volume. These notes would be excellent for teaching Cather at any level. The notes also provide helpful information for the advanced reader interested in learning more about how Cather constructed her writing. Readers familiar with Cather’s novels will find evidence of her expansive writing style in her shorter pieces. For instance, in reading Cather’s short stories in sequence, the reader can observe how she conveys a sense of her main characters struggling against a broad, vast landscape in settings both east and west of the Mississippi. W hether reading Cather for enjoyment or scholarship, this volume is worth the investment. -^JiELEN TAYLOR GrandJunction, Colorado Xs&amShepard. By David J. DeRose. (New York: Twayne, 1992. 171 pages, $21.95.) Sam Shepard. By Martin Tucker. (New York: Continuum, 1992. 179 pages, HH9.95.) There are good reasons for adding to the body of works on Sam Shepard. David DeRose names a few in his study, which is part of the Twayne’s United States Authors Series. According to DeRose, critics have focused “with dulling repetition” on Shepard’s unique (western) American vision, thereby neglecting his theatrical intentions. They have ignored Shepard’s “lost” plays, such as Cowboys, Up to Thursday, and Blue Bitch. And, of course, they could not have included States of Shock, Shepard’s first drama in six years and a drama unlike anything he has written in more than two decades. Reviews 179 To DeRose, the visual imagery and physical staging in Shepard’s drama provide the key to understanding the common ground between his theatrical and thematic images. DeRose sees as this common ground Shepard’s preoccu­ pation with heightened “states of consciousness manifesting themselves in a perception of the self and the world as unfixed.” In this unfixed world, Shepard’s heroes reject and rediscover their homes, heritage, and heroism. Although DeRose follows up his thesis with a fine and careful reading of the plays, his study falls short on two counts. First, the author inadvertently under­ cuts one of his selling points in stating that Shepard’s unpublished plays “have earned the obscurity to which they have been relegated.”Accordingly sketchy is his treatment of these works. Second, DeRose overlooks that the very West which he chooses not to explore provides the common ground that he seeks. In The Tooth of Crime, True West, and other works, the characters strive for states of consciousness combin­ ing realism and surrealism, intellect and the emotions. Crow in The Tooth of Crime goes beyond a “surface of floating images,” while Hoss transcends “the presence of something real behind the style.” In the end, the Gypsy Crow symbolically reconnects with the land in taking over Hoss’s turf, while Hoss puts his gun in his mouth and dies in true style. Hoss and Crow, like the other warring characters in Shepard’s drama, can only trade places because they feel at home as much on the old western frontier as on the new western freeway. Their West is one of continual change, where myth and reality co-exist, as they do in the final stage image of True West. The odd brothers square off to...