Famous editor Maxwell Perkins, who unearthed Hemingway and Scott (F. Scott Fitzgerald, author of The Great Gatsby), unearthed the brilliantly talented author Thomas Wolfe.
Thomas has a talent for writing, but he likes to show off his words too much. The male protagonist wrote 80 pages of the scene where he falls in love with a lady at first sight at the station. Maxwell slashed the excess of Thomas' sentences—from eighty pages to three sentences! Their collaboration was also a great success. But as Thomas rose to fame, he also became less willing to listen to Maxwell.
When reading a book, we often praise the talent of the author, but rarely think about how many times these delicate words have been scrutinized. In many cases, the editor's contribution also contributed. The most impressive scene in the movie is when Maxwell and Thomas broke up again after arguing with Thomas over the deletion of the plot, Maxwell confessed to his family that he often doubted his own judgment - facing the genius author, what he did Did everything in the book help him to keep the essentials out, or did it distort and even kill the author's talent? He often thinks about this and can't sleep at night.
Between headstrong serenity and painful self-doubt, I'd probably choose the latter, though it's also an unsolvable conundrum.
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