As a playwright, Sam shepard he knew how to transfer the most splendid art of the monologue to this novel. The history of theater, as a scenic art, is determined by great soliloquies that point to immortality from the simplicity of the character, of the human faced with his destiny.
From the Greeks to Shakespeare, Calderón de la Barca Valle Inclán or Samuel Beckett; the greatest glory of theater has passed through a lonely protagonist who directly evokes tragedy ...
It is about extolling our ridiculous existence with respect to a vast world, a cosmos that offers infinity as any answer to a simple glance at the celestial dome. The theater has tried to give voice and interpretation to those little questions about us that, deep down, we would like to throw into the immensity that surrounds us in case someone could attend to the claim of our contradictions and guilt. Immortality is a small text that exposes a simple question posed in millions of questions about what we are.
The best thing about this book is that the protagonist on whom the focus falls in the silent scene is ourselves. Because Sam Shepard also invites us to enjoy his acting profession.
We become actors in the skin of another. Once we empathize with the guy who remains in a bed, in the throes of a disturbing sleeplessness, we enter into that search for what we are from the simplest and most everyday, from our most deeply rooted conflicts that make it difficult to recover the easy sleep of the child we once harbored.
And although I get metaphysical, it is not about finding great musings in this novel, perhaps dreamlike approaches about love, family, guilt.
It is true that the case of the protagonist of the novel deals with a particular life, but the shadows of his thoughts between consciousness and unconsciousness concern us all.
The particular soliloquy from the sleeping candle introduces us to a dream owner who probably loved the wrong person, which cost him to renounce the figure of his father, who also loved that same woman: Felicity. A recurring aspect within the entire narrative, a thread that unites everything, as parenthood and motherhood always link.
Sam Shepard lying on his bed, trying to move from his guilt and resentment to restful sleep. Sam Shepard climbed back onto the stage of the theater he loved so much. A novel turned into the Shepard who once dreamed of being Hamlet.
You can now buy the novel I Inside, the last book of the late Sam Shepard, here: