The arc of the American story is long, it is bumpy and uncertain, but it always bends toward a more perfect union.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
The short story, on the other hand, is the perfect American form.
The American story is a story of great moments and dreadful moments.
There's something with the physical size of America... American writers can write about America and it can still feel like a foreign country.
Since I can't write the greatest American novel, I'm going to write the longest American novel.
The American writer has his hands full, trying to understand and then describe and then make credible much of American reality.
When I was asked to come over to the States, I thought to myself, 'What the Americans are very good at doing is creating stories with strong movement and plots that carry the movie as it goes along.'
Every film you're commissioned to write is all about an arc; usually, the arc is that the world creates a change in the character, usually for the better. To not have an arc, the messages and ideas in the film became more prominent.
I don't really know what the Great American Novel is. I like the idea that there could be one now, and I wouldn't object if someone thought it was mine, but I don't claim to have written that - I just wrote my book.
American history is longer, larger, more various, more beautiful, and more terrible than anything anyone has ever said about it.
I feel like if a film is well-written, then the character's arc is complete. There really is very little room to expand on that afterwards.