East of Eden is an Atlantic crossing

When I was younger, I thought America was one massive city. It came to me on E4 in sitcoms with hundreds of episodes; it was brownstones and bars and diners. And it was not until I visited the country that I realised that most of America is a wilderness of forests and plains that puts our “countryside”, with its chequerboard of steady browns and greens, to timid, miniature shame.