When writing goes painfully, when itโs hideously difficult, and one feels real despair (ah, the despair, silly as it is, is real!)โthen naturally one ought to continue with the work; it would be cowardly to retreat. But when writing goes smoothlyโwhy then one certainly should keep on working, since it would be stupid to stop. Consequently one is always writing or should be writing.
Joyce Carol OatesA mouth of no distinction but well practiced, before I entered my teens, in irony. For what is irony but the repository of hurt? And what is hurt but the repository of hope?
Joyce Carol OatesIt's impossible to read a distinctive stylist like Faulkner, Joyce, Kafka, Mann, Woolf, James - and many more - without wanting to write, however entirely different one's writing will be.
Joyce Carol OatesI do what I want to do. It was a brash statement of(her)girlhood. Now she was an adult, the boast seemed quaint. For rarely do you know what you want. Even after you've done it you can't say clearly if that was what you'd wanted or just something that happened to you, like weather.
Joyce Carol Oates