摘要
分析評價美國劇作家山姆˙夏普德(Sam Shepard)觸及家庭三部曲《烈火家園》《埋藏的孩子》《西部實錄》對美國夢的觀點，可從美國超越主義鼻祖愛默生切入探討。夏普德的美國夢可來自於個人自己的美國經驗，由於孩提時期經常的遷徙以及一九七○年代初期自我放逐到英國的經歷，促成他極力地想了解「身為一個美國人的意義」為何。綜觀其劇本，夏普德在家庭三部曲中強烈地表現出對美國文化的關懷和對土地的那份緊密不可分的關係。概括地分析，夏普德的家庭劇通常真實地表現出他與父親間的衝突。如同另一位當代美國劇作家田納西˙威廉的《玻璃動物園》(The Glass Menagerie)一劇，夏普德的《西部實錄》中兩兄弟的命運事實上是被一位隱形的父親所控制。夏普德的家庭劇除了表現出親子和解的渴望外，對其美國人主體意識的關切也是昭然若揭。
夏普德的家庭三部曲可以視為探就其美國夢架構的一種體現。每齣劇本除了相當別出心裁深刻地批判美國夢，同時也交織建構著一個共同主題－－探索某種美國夢實現的可能性。夏普德之所以有別於同時期的美國劇作家的主要原因，在於他劇中除了解構美國夢的迷思外，同時也建構他理想中實現美國夢的可能性。夏普德建構實現美國夢的戲劇手法可從劇中透顯出「幻滅」、「察覺」及「實現」三個階段。劇中家庭成員因受到亂淪、殺嬰等影響，導致對美國夢的幻滅而不敢寄望將來。在了解到生命本是一個生死相互循環的模式後，夏普德的劇中成員才開始走出過去的陰霾，邁向充滿生命力的未來。

Abstract
This thesis is an analysis and assessment of Sam Shepard’s treatment of the American dream in three family plays: Curse of the Starving Class, Buried Child and True West. As a whole, these three plays, commonly known as his family trilogy, express Shepard’s strong bond with the land and frontier pioneer tradition of the American West and his concern with the present state of American culture. My fundamental argument is this: while Shepherd clearly sees how the traditional American sense of the dream, as a force of strength and self-renewal, has been lost in the contemporary materialistic society, his plays function ultimately to “rediscover” this dream in all its idealistic purity, to show how we may still realize it in an act of personal and/or cultural self-regeneration.
Shepard’s family trilogy then can be regarded as a microcosm of his ongoing exploration of the meaning of the “American dream.” Each play criticizes one aspect of this dream while at the same time attempting to (re)embody or (re)enact it. What distinguishes Shepard from his contemporary playwrights is that he not only deconstructs the myth of the American dream but simultaneously presents the possibility of realizing it. Shepard’s writing of the family trilogy can thus be divided into three stages: disillusionment with the dream, aware- ness of one’s own identity within the wider context of that dream, and finally the realization or rediscovery of this dream for oneself, in one’s own life. While the characters in these plays have become in various ways disillusioned with themselves and their families, ques- tioning their individual and cultural meaning and purpose, and try in various ways to escape, nonetheless they are able, having experienced in some form the cycle of death-rebirth, to emerge out of their pasts and look forward to a new life and new understanding in the future.

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