Sam Shepard (1943-2017) Tribute List

Playwright and actor Sam Shepard died on July 27, 2017 of ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig's disease. He was 73 years old. Shepard won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1979 for his play Buried Child. His tales of families coming apart at the seams leapt of the stage with an urgency and electricity rarely seen in the theater before or since. Shepard also found success as an actor in Hollywood, notably in 1984's The Right Stuff, in which he played Chuck Yeager. Shepard was nominated for an Academy Award for the role. As is evident in the quotes below, Shepard was interested in authenticity and immediacy, and had a lot of interesting things to say about art and life. Here are eleven vocabulary words from the words and work of Sam Shepard.
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. chaos
    formless state of matter before the creation of the cosmos
    I'm a great believer in chaos. I don't believe that you start with a formula and then you fulfill the formula. Chaos is a much better instigator, because we live in chaos - we don't live in a rigorous form.- Interview, 2013
  2. resonate
    evoke or suggest a strong meaning or belief
    In real life we don't know what's going to happen next. So how can you be that way on a stage? Being alive to the possibility of not knowing exactly how everything is going to happen next - if you can find places to have that happen onstage, it can resonate with an experience of living. - Interview, 2012
  3. contrived
    showing effects of planning or manipulation
    Personality is everything that's false in a human: everything that's been added on to him and contrived.- Interview, 1984
  4. spontaneity
    the quality of coming from feelings without constraint
    I'm still very much a believer in the spontaneity of certain kinds of writing. But then you have to eventually, when you're writing a long play, make adjustments along the way - all kinds of adjustments.- Interview, 2012
  5. perplexing
    lacking clarity of meaning
    I hate endings. Just detest them. Beginnings are definitely the most exciting, middles are perplexing and endings are a disaster. … The temptation towards resolution, towards wrapping up the package, seems to me a terrible trap. Why not be more honest with the moment? The most authentic endings are the ones which are already revolving towards another beginning. That’s genius.- Interview, 1977
  6. persist
    refuse to stop
    When you consider all the writers who never even had a machine. Who would have given an eyeball for a good typewriter. Any typewriter. All the ones who wrote on a matchbook covers. Paper bags. Toilet paper. Who had their writing destroyed by their jailers. Who persisted beyond all odds.- True West
  7. salvation
    rescuing or protecting someone or something from harm
    Well it is like salvation sort of. I mean the smell. I love the smell of toast. And the sun's coming up. It makes me feel like anything's possible. Y'know?- True West
  8. depreciate
    decline in value
    Everyone wants a piece of land. It's the only sure investment. It can never depreciate like a car or a washing machine. Land will double its value in ten years. In less than that. Land is going up every day.- Curse of the Starving Class
  9. totalitarianism
    a form of government in which the ruler is unconstrained
    Democracy's a very fragile thing. You have to take care of democracy. As soon as you stop being responsible to it and allow it to turn into scare tactics, it's no longer democracy, is it? It's something else. It may be an inch away from totalitarianism. - Interview, 2004
  10. reckon
    take account of
    I feel like I've never had a home, you know? I feel related to the country, to this country, and yet I don't know exactly where I fit in... There's always this kind of nostalgia for a place, a place where you can reckon with yourself.- Interview, 1979
  11. vast
    unusually great in size or amount or extent or scope
    There's no way to escape the fact that we've grown up in a violent culture, we just can't get away from it, it's part of our heritage. I think part of it is that we've always felt somewhat helpless in the face of this vast continent. Helplessness is answered in many ways, but one of them is violence. - Interview, 2010
Created on Mon Jul 31 15:15:37 EDT 2017 (updated Mon Jul 31 16:32:32 EDT 2017)

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