"The Case Against the Trauma Plot" by Parul Sehgal

even*cleveland

“Re-read this valuable essay after watching Zoe Kazan's adaptation of EAST OF EDEN. Florence Pugh was terrific, but changing Cathy's origin story to a trauma plot struck me as a massive failure of imagination. Something similar mars Marlon James' THE DISAPPEARERS, which also has a trauma plot that presents the reader with what Seghal calls "locks and keys."”