"Written with great lucidity and wearing its considerable erudition lightly, Understanding Sam Shepard is the perfect introduction to Shepard for both beginning and advanced students of American Drama. Because of its subtlety and depth of textual analysis, the book is equally valuable for the scholar. James A. Crank unearths Shepard's buried children and their cursed families in all their complexity and mystery, making a compelling case for the unity and profundity of Shepard's mythic vision of America."--Henry I. Schvey, professor of drama and comparative literature, Wahington University in St. Louis --Book Jacket.