In novels, and American novels in particular, it's not just about redemption, it's about forward movement and healing oneself. Americans are very big on getting better.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the American belief in personal growth and healing through literature.
Hanya Yanagihara highlights the profound themes often present in American novels, specifically the journey of redemption alongside an essential focus on personal growth and healing. This reflects a broader cultural narrative in America that values self-improvement and the aspiration to 'get better' in life, suggesting that literature can be a powerful catalyst for such transformations.
In practice
A book club discussion on the themes of personal growth in modern American literature.
It's a funny thing about cities: Some have brief, bright moments of cultural and political dominance, decades- or centuries-long spells when they seem the center of their particular nation, or region, or empire... only to later fall into obscurity and disrepair, never to regain their former glory.
Dialogue is the place that books are most alive and forge the most direct connection with readers. It is also where we as writers discover our characters and allow them to become real.
In accordance with the terms of the Clarke-Asimov treaty, the second-best science writer dedicates this book to the second-best science-fiction writer. [dedication to Isaac Asimov from Arthur C. Clarke in his book Report on Planet Three]
When I read something saying I've not done anything as good as 'Catch-22' I'm tempted to reply, 'Who has?'
Nobody knows that in reading we are re-living our temptations to be a poet. All readers who have a certain passion for reading, nurture and repress, through reading, the desire to become a writer.
If a secret history of books could be written, and the author's private thoughts and meanings noted down alongside of his story, how many insipid volumes would become interesting, and dull tales excite the reader!
I can think of no other writer who so thoroughly embodies the Jamesian spirit as Alison Lurie. Like him she can excavate all the possibilities of a theme. Like his, her books seem long, unbroken threads, seamless progressions of effects.
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