Shepard aims to highlight the destructive nature of the declining American Dream in the family of Buried Child and broadens it to the whole society. The works of the predecessors like O’Neill, Williams, Miller and Albee served as a great inspiration in forming his critical view. In his various works he chooses different themes to represent the decline of the society, but the plot is usually set in a familial context. Showing the disintegration of the basic unit of the society refers to the fact that the deterioration has pervaded the whole society.