Joyce Carol Oates

Sometimes I read reviews, and without exception I will read critical essays that are sent to me. The critical essays are interesting on their own terms. ↗

— Joyce Carol Oates

#essays #exception #i #interesting #me

The books I read I do enjoy, very much; otherwise I wouldn't read them. Most of them are for review, for the New York Review of Books, and substantial. ↗

— Joyce Carol Oates

#enjoy #i #i do #most #much

The cleaning is something I use as a reward if I get some work done. I go into a very happy state of mind when I'm vacuuming. ↗

— Joyce Carol Oates

#done #get #go #happy #i

The third man in the ring makes boxing possible. ↗

— Joyce Carol Oates

#makes #man #possible #ring #third

To be Jewish is to be specifically identified with a history. And if you're not aware of that when you're a child, the whole tradition is lost. ↗

— Joyce Carol Oates

#child #history #identified #jewish #lost

To be knocked out doesn't mean what it seems. A boxer does not have to get up. ↗

— Joyce Carol Oates

#does #get #knocked #mean #out

We are linked by blood, and blood is memory without language. ↗

— Joyce Carol Oates

#language #linked #memory #without

What I aspired to be and was not, comforts me. ↗

— Joyce Carol Oates

#comforts #i #me

Where we come from in America no longer signifies. It's where we go, and what we do when we get there, that tells us who we are. ↗

— Joyce Carol Oates

#come #get #go #longer #signifies

You need so much energy and encouragement to write that if someone says something negative, some of that energy goes. ↗

— Joyce Carol Oates

#energy #goes #much #need #negative