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The American Dream In Ansel's Buried Child

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fuels the growth of hatred that extends not only to others but also to the self and causes great mental disorder. This disorder leads to the destruction of the family and its disintegration. The American playwright Sam Sheppard experiences the era of family disintegration in American society. He could not turn a blind eye to such social problem that threatens the lives of the American family and the lives of the American community as a whole. His family trilogy and other plays are illustrations and personifications of the American family disintegration. These plays include absent fatherhood from family life because of the father 's failure to achieve the American dream and the standards required for his family 's life. Sam Sheppard …show more content…

He is amazingly idolized by his mother, Halide. He is ' ' All American hero". His death due to suspicious circumstances in a motel room without achieving his mother 's hopes reflects the disillusionment and disappointment that many American feel when they realize the cruel reality of the American dream. The character of Ansel has been symbolically utilized by Shepard as the hopes that the American dream carries but the death of Ansel is also symbolically utilized as the end of all hopes of the American dream. Halie says “I put all my hopes in Ansel….. He was the smartest.” (Buried Child 26). In Curse of the Starving Class, it is obvious that the American Dream is a deluding goal. The family is trying to save their falling farm and home to keep their life going by different means but all came to nothing. Eventually, all their dreams vanish and the family is destroyed and disintegrated by the capitalist system. The portrayed family is a metaphor of the failure of the American dream, since the fundamentals of the American dream is the formation of a stable family enjoying the prosperity and well-being. It is also able to achieve ambitions for all members of the family. On the contrary, the play depicts and illustrates the life of a miserable and disintegrated family that is deprived of the values of a true nuclear family. The negative impacts caused by hollowness, disappointment, and frustration of the American dream resulted in absent fatherhood or absent patriarchal role in the life of the American family. The absence of the patriarchal role of the life of the American family is one main reason behind the dissonance and disintegration of the American

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