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Sam Shepard

Motel Chronicles Paperback – January 1, 2001

by Sam Shepard (Author)

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Motel Chronicles reveals the fast-moving and sometimes surprising world of the man behind the plays that have made Sam Shepard a living legend in the theater. Shepard chronicles his own life birth in Illinois, childhood memories of Guam, Pasadena and rural Southern California, adventures as ranch hand, waiter, rock musician, dramatist and film actor. Scenes from this book form the basis of his play Superstitions, and of the film (directed by Wim Wenders) Paris, Texas, winner of the Golden Palm Award at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival.

" . . . essential reading. A scrapbook of short stories, autobiographical reveries, poetry and photographs, Motel Chronicles is full of verbal delights, as well as insights into its author's entire canon. Whether Mr. Shepard is reminiscing about his parents or daydreaming about cherished movies and cars of his youth, he speaks in pungent and ethereal language that remakes our West. Read in conjunction with the plays, Motel Chronicles also helps demystify the origins of Mr. Shepard's psychological obsessions and desolate frontier iconography."--Frank Rich, New York Times

"If plays were put in time capsules, future generations would get a sharp-toothed profile of life in the U.S. in the past decade and half from the works of Sam Shepard."--Time

"Sam Shepard is a shaman--a New World shaman. Sam is as American as peyote, magic mushrooms, Rock and Roll, and medicine bundles."--Jack Gelber

Sam Shepard (1943) is a playwright, actor, author, screen writer and director whose work is performed on and off Broadway and in other theaters across the country. In 1979, he received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his play Buried Child. In 1983, he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in The Right Stuff. His other famous works include True West, A Lie of the Mind and Curse of the Starving Class. Fool For Love & the Sad Lament of Pecos Bill by Sam Shepard was also published by City Lights Publishers.

Print length

110 pages
Language

English
Publisher

City Lights Books
Publication date

January 1, 2001
Dimensions

5.75 x 0.5 x 8 inches
ISBN-10

0872861430
ISBN-13

978-0872861435
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Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ City Lights Books; First Edition (January 1, 2001)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 110 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0872861430
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0872861435
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 6.7 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.75 x 0.5 x 8 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #317,508 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #66 in Pacific Islanders Biographies
- #121 in Drama Literary Criticism
- #171 in Western U.S. Biographies

Customer Reviews:
92 ratings

About the author

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Sam Shepard

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Sam Shepard was born in 1943 in Fort Sheridan, Illinois. He moved to New York from California just as the off-Broadway theatre scene was emerging. He has written more than forty plays, of which elev en have won 'Obie' awards, besides collections of stories, prose writing and screenplays. His plays include Buried Child, The Late Henry Moss, Simpatico, Curse of the Starving Class, True West, Fool for Love, A Lie of the Mind, and States of Shock. His screenplay for Paris, Texas won the Golden Pa lm Award at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival and he directed his own screenplay, Far North, in 1988. A member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, Shepard received the Gold Medal for Drama from the Academy in 1992, and in 1994 he was inducted into the Theatre Hall of Fame.

Customer reviews

5 star		79%
4 star		11%
3 star		3%
2 star		2%
1 star		4%

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C. Ebeling

Not a major work but it fascinates

Reviewed in the United States on December 2, 2003

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MOTEL CHRONICLES was recommended on a website devoted to journal writing. It is non-sequential and many of the entries have the shape of honed work but all the same it is a good example of a writer's sketchbook, one used for practice and inspiration. More importantly, it is a window on Shepard's frame of mind in the years immediately following the Pulitzer Prize for BURIED CHILD. The seeds of later works can be found in this book.
The entries swim back and forth from 1978 -1982, mapping the writer's peripatetic movement around the country, mostly in California and the west. It captures bits of his early identities, military childhood on the move, waiter, cowboy, actor, writer, friend, lover, husband, father. It is framed by portraits of being a child, the first entry is one of his earliest childhood memories in his mother's arms; the last is the adult caring for a mother felled by a brain aneurysm. This is no confessional or revealing autobiographical piece, however, just a writer at work pulling out inspiration from experience. Shepard is highly articulate, his portrayal of the contemporary west is priceless, and his poetry is not bad at all. The writing has an honest, non-star-turn quality to it.

9 people found this helpful

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Chris Bowen

Shepard Gets Better With Age

Reviewed in the United States on August 23, 2010

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I purchased this book because I had just finished Shepard's more recent "Day out of Days." What I found most interesting is how Shepard has aged so damn well as a writer. "Motel Chronicles" was a great read yet is really just an excellent rough draft compared to his more recent work. "Motel Chronicles" starts to shape Shepard's great feel of the modern day lonesome dessert highway. What does stick out in this book is Shepard's humor. Muhammad Ali was once asked why he was always being so funny. He explained that he never tried to be funny. He just told the truth. Shepard does the same. In between tasting the dessert and feeling Shepard's despondent characters in freeze-fame so well, I found myself laughing out loud. Shepard makes no attempt at well-crafted jokes. He just tells the truth. And sometimes its damn funny. It's a quick and worthwhile read.

Chris Bowen
Author of Our Kids: Building Relationships in the Classroom

6 people found this helpful

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Palliative Doc

Great writer

Reviewed in the United States on December 24, 2021

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What can I say, a great piece of writing.

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B

This is the America I grew up hoping was out there .

Reviewed in the United States on October 24, 2018

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This is the America I grew up hoping was there. No one captures that dream and reality like he did. He will be missed.

2 people found this helpful

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Barbara Marling

... I think the author has tried to put a better spin on himself than is shown in Shepard and ...

Reviewed in the United States on August 9, 2016

Verified Purchase

Absolutely fabulous although I think the author has tried to put a better spin on himself than is shown in Shepard and Dark. There were actually a few pieces that I especially noted and some that elicited some good chuckles but the Nina Simone incident was especially wonderful.

3 people found this helpful

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Milan

Five Stars

Reviewed in the United States on May 19, 2018

Verified Purchase

nice clean book, interesting reading, thank you.

One person found this helpful

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javier larrea