Fool for Love & The Sad Lament of Pecos Bill

by Sam Shepard

In Fool For Love , situated at a seedy motel on the edge of the Mojave Desert, transient lovers May and Eddie spin around in a room in a relentless struggle for power and truth. Through recollections and dreams, multiple versions of a fierce and fatal love story are told. The Sad Lament of Pecos Bill on the Eve of Killing His Wife , another kind of love story in the form of a comic operetta, takes a distaff view of the Southwest's legendary cowpuncher and his mate Slue-foot Sue, with irreverent commentary on American heroes and heroics. "No one knows better than Sam Shepard that the true American West is gone forever, but there may be no writer alive more gifted at reinventing it out of pure literary air." -Frank Rich, The New York Times "Mr. Shepard is the most deeply serious humorist of the American theater, and a poet with no use whatever for the 'poetic.' He brings fresh news of love, here and now, in all its potency and deviousness and foolishness, and of many other matters as well." -Edith Oliver, The New Yorker 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.

Genres: Plays, Fiction, Drama

150 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1983

About the author

Sam Shepard was an American artist who worked as an award-winning playwright, writer and actor. His many written works are known for being frank and often absurd, as well as for having an authentic sense of the style and sensibility of the gritty modern American west. He was an actor of the stage and motion pictures; a director of stage and film; author of several books of short stories, essays, and memoirs; and a musician.

Reviews

[Chris]

Goodreads is a great place for recommendations of books you might not ordinarily read unless touted by other readers or mentioned in another book. That happened to me with “Tom Lake” by Ann Patchett. In it Lara is plucked out of obscurity acting in a local production of “Our Town” to star in a Hollywood movie. While waiting for the movie to hit the big screen she performs in summer stock plays at Tom Lake in Michigan. There she stars in a series of plays and falls in love with her leading man, a future film superstar. But her love affair, like Paul Simon’s “April, Come She Will”, is born when the flowers bud in April and dies when the leaves wither and fall in September.

The brilliance of “Tom Lake” is how Ms Patchett shows the life cycle of the love affair through the shows they acted in that summer. Lara reminisces about the affair years later with her family on her cherry farm. Like her character in the Tom Lake production of “The Cherry Orchard”, she hoped to maintain the status quo of the beauty of the orchard. But she had also hoped to keep the lovely memories of her acting, and her love affair, a secret.

Her first role in Summer Stock is in “Our Town” which she had already acted in and where she first made her mark. This is a piece of cake for her. She plays Emily, she knows the part, she’s just being herself, barely acting. Problems begin when she has to play May in Sam Shepard’s “Fool For Love”. It’s the end of the summer, the romance is running out of steam, there is another woman, the part of May is way outside of Lara’s comfort zone, and she’s laying an egg.

“Fool For Love” is as far afield for her as New Hampshire, where “Our Town” is situated, is from the Southwest of “Fool For Love”. Like the 2,480 miles Eddie claims to have traveled to see May. And May is 180 degrees different from the virginal Emily. May has been around the block once too many times with Eddie and she doesn’t want to go around again. Until he shows up again in her motel room, that is. Eddie wants her to move in with her. She would like to move on, she even has a date that evening. And she accuses Eddie of seeing another woman, The Countess. But her attachment to Eddie is too strong and very destructive. May can’t live with him and she can’t live without him. She has self-loathing issues. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that Eddie is her half brother. This is revealed by the imaginary figure of their father who adds his two cents as exposition at various times during the play.

So what is the truth? Does May really have a date? Does Eddie really have a ranch in Wyoming he can whisk her away to? Does Eddie have another woman? Then why does he want May to move away with him? Is everyone like the Old Man, who claims to be married to Barbara Mandrell, but only in his mind? Truth and illusion. The truth is May knows that Eddie always leaves. The illusions are all the promises he makes when he returns.

That’s when it hit me how great “Fool For Love” is, how great a writer Sam Shepard was, and what an influence his writing had on others who wrote about the Southwest. A case in point is Cormac McCarthy. McCarthy”s last two books “The Passenger” and “Stella Maris” are almost identical to “Fool For Love” in their themes of truth and illusion. They also feature an incestuous relationship between a brother and sister and the sister is plagued by illusions of dwarves who annoy her (and the reader).

Like I said, one book always leads to another on Goodreads. I had never read a play by Sam Shepard before but “Fool For Love” was outstanding. I can’t wait to read more of his works. No fooling.

[N]

A darkly brutal and slow-burner of a play. With biting dialogue and an ear for dark humor, it is definitely a modern theater classic and recommended for those who are delving into modern drama.

[Jaimi]

Fool for love is up there with the best plays I have ever read

[aya]

amazing and fucked up and beautiful. would love to see both of these on stage.

[Jennifer]

What's not to love about this explosive, dark and captivating play? I found it absolutely brilliant.

[ro runkel]

whenever my life starts feeling like a sam shepard play i know i need to start calling my mom more

[Ali]

Reading what so ever written by Shepard means going through a shortened social history of America after ww II, and up till the end of 20.century. Plots are so simple and dialogues are not very much sophisticated. Maybe some of works by Shepard are not as interesting as the others, but for those whom are interested in sociology, and drama as writing-art, will enjoy reading or watching works by Shepard. Reading simple and plain plays by Shepard gives you dare to sit and write about whatsoever plot you have in your mind. Many of his plays are so easy, but honest, fluent and great as well. After watching Paris, Texas by Wenders, I believe Wenders shots matches with Shepard’s atmosphere and dialogues. ”Few American playwrights have exerted as much influence on the contemporary stage as Sam Shepard. His plays are performed on and off Broadway and in all the major regional American theatres. They are also widely performed and studied in Europe, finding both a popular and a scholarly audience" .
با وجودی که سام شپارد، موضوعاتی گاه پیش پا افتاده را با زبانی ساده و در عین حال بصورتی حیرت انگیز طرح می کند، نمی دانم چرا تا کنون به فارسی برگردانده نشده اند، یا احتمالن من ندیده ام. خواندن شپارد اگر هیچ نباشد، دست کم درس بزرگی ست برای آنها که می خواهند بنویسند، و آنها که سال هاست می نویسند اما آن چنان سنگین که انگار "وزنه برداری" می کنند! آثار سام شپارد به نمایش نامه ها و داستان های کوتاهش محدود نمی شوند. او در زمینه ی موسیقی جاز و پاپ هم کار کرده و برخی از سروده هایش برای خوانندگان صاحب نام، مشهور است. سام شپارد بازیگر سینما و تیاتر هم هست و در برخی از فیلم ها همچون "فرانسیس" یا "دیگه نیا دم در" (ویم وندرس) با همسرش "جسیکا لنگ" همبازی بوده است. سام شپارد هم چنین نقد تیاتر و سینما هم می نویسد و برخی از نقدهایش در مجلات مشهور انگلیسی زبان منتشر می شوند.

[R.K. Cowles]

4 1/2 stars

[Lauren]

Full disclosure: I read the first third of Fool for Love while distracted. I most likely would have better appreciated the play as a whole if I had been focused in the beginning, although I would stop short of saying I would have liked it.

Here’s the plot: People are messed up and dysfunctional. This time our tableau is former lovers in a hotel room.

Sam Shepard is a well-regarded playwright. I’m operating under the assumption that’s why this otherwise forgettable one act received attention and accolades.

The edition I read also included a musical play, The Sad Lament of Pecos Bill, which I found the more creative and intriguing of the two. If someone had asked me to pick which one was a runner-up for a Pulitzer, I would have (wrongly) picked Pecos Bill. Quasi-recommended.

[Debra Daniels-Zeller]

Fool for love is really meant to be part of a trilogy of plays, and it makes more sense with the other plays, but I actually liked reading all the stage directions, the descriptions of props, the set and even the lighting. I could easily picture the cheap hotel with a blinking neon sign on the edge of the desert and Eddie and May, who have a tangled past. May accuses Eddie of sleeping with the Countess and says she can smell her on Eddie. The fighting goes back and forth, but when the old man speaks, their relationship is closer than at first glance and the old man is the cause of their current misery. Poor Martin, May's date is left to witness the couple's meltdown. A New York Times review said, "In Mr. Shepherd's world, people never really know themselves, much less anybody else." But they certainly know how to twist the knives in each other.

[Leo Espluga]

Del autor de Paris, texas.
Construye un universo decadente, de antiguos colonia cowboys, un oeste arcaico y triste. Un oeste de vaqueros desplazados y fuera de lugar.
Un retrato de unos personajes que se decomponen en escena, un retrato de la obsesión. Y un mundo onírico atmosférico

[Jackie]

Loved the movie, loved the soundtrack, but the play is toughto read.

[Laur]

Fool for love was well written, had intricate and interesting stage directions that really lent to the drama of the play, but I am not sure I really go the point of a story about half siblings who are in love? With their dead father looming between them sort of real to them but not actually there the whole time? But definitely not like anything I'd read before, and it kind of reminded me of the "classic" style of writing plays used to have as opposed to the new fangled everything is however you want it to be style plays are composed in now.
I really liked a few of May's short monologues in it, I think she would be really interesting to play. And the fight between wanting Eddie to leave and stay that she experiences throughout would be a fun duality to see on stage done live too.
May: - (very cold, quick, almost monotone voice like she's writing him a letter) - "I don't understand my feelings. I really don't. I don't understand how I could hate you so much after so much time. How, no matter how much I'd like not to hate you, I hate you even more. It grows. I can't even see you now. All I see is a picture of you. You and her. I don't even know if the picture's real anymore. I don't even care. It's a made up picture. It invades my head. The two of you. And this picture stings even more than if I'd actually seen you with her. It cuts me. It cuts me so deep I'll never get over it. And I can't get rid of this picture either. It just comes. Uninvited. Kinda' like a little torture. And I blame you more for this little torture than I do for what you did."

The Sad Lament of Pecos Bill was a strange little (sung and mostly Rhymed) short little 'play' that was very bizarre, but had an interesting end. The final line "But from death you can never escape" feels like the whole theme.

[LYS.]

“MAY: I get sick every time you come around. Then I get sick when you leave. You’re like a disease to me.” —page 33

spoiler: came in looking for something to pass the time and found a doomed half-siblings love story. of course. guys . . . I CAN’T KEEP BEING THE INCEST PERSON. HELP ME.

now that we got that out of the way, FOOL FOR LOVE puts the drama back in drama, baby! may and eddie are volatile, prone to bursts of action, but they’re not so far from their moments of intense reflection. their feelings for each other is a never-ending pendulum swinging from love to hate with a fierceness that is both terrifying as it is gripping to witness. it’s a cycle of loving and hating and leaving and coming back, a . . . generational curse, so to speak!

as for THE SAD LAMENT OF PESCOS BILL—it’s the first time i’ve ever come across a comic operetta, so that was fun! also, the commentary on heroism and death was really neat. sorry, i don’t have much to say on this, i’m still stuck on may and eddie and that damned old man, guys. jesus christ.

[Andrew]

*The Sad Lament of Pecos Bill on the Eve of Killing His Wife*

This is the only way to find this particular play, even though I already own the "Fool for Love and Other Plays" collection of Shepard's work. This is slight by design, but more compelling and endearing than I expected. Very plainspoken, which is not typical of the bulk of his work so far, and I think I like it quite a bit.

[Tracy]

I only read this because it was a play mentioned in "Tom Lake" and I wanted to see what it was about. I did not like it.

[cutebunnythe3rd]

its so strange and well written, i wish i couldve seen it in action

[E A]

Incest so this is definitely literary fiction

[Nicole]

Atmosphere and dialogue on point, but the plot felt like a bit of a stereotype though I love a dingy motel as much as the next person. I also really liked Pecos Bill but couldn’t find a recording to listen to, unfortunately.