Joyce Carol Oates

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Joyce Carol Oates, 1992. (credit: AP)

(born June 16, 1938, Lockport, N.Y., U.S.) U.S. writer. Oates taught at the University of Windsor (1967 – 78) and Princeton University (from 1978). Beginning with the story collection By the North Gate (1963) and the novel With Shuddering Fall (1964), she wrote prolifically, often portraying people whose intensely experienced lives end in bloodshed and self-destruction owing to forces beyond their control. Her major novels include them (1969), Do with Me What You Will (1973), Foxfire (1993), and Beasts (2002). Also significant is a parodic gothic series including Bellefleur (1980), A Bloodsmoor Romance (1982), and Mysteries of Winterthurn (1984).

For more information on Joyce Carol Oates, visit Britannica.com.

One of the United States's most prolific and versatile contemporary writers, Joyce Carol Oates (born 1938) focuses upon the spiritual, sexual, and intellectual decline of modern American society.

Oates was born into a working-class Catholic family outside Lockport, New York, and was raised amid a rural setting on her maternal grandparents' farm. She attended a one-room schoolhouse in Erie County, a parallel community to her fictitious Eden County where many of her works are set, and displayed an early interest in storytelling by drawing picture-tales before she could write. Oates has said that her childhood "was dull, ordinary, nothing people would be interested in," but has admitted that "a great deal frightened me." In 1953 at age fifteen, Oates wrote her first novel, though it was rejected by publishers who found its subject matter, which concerned the rehabilitation of a drug dealer, exceedingly depressing for adolescent audiences.

Oates began her academic career at Syracuse University and graduated from there as class valedictorian in 1960. In 1961 she received a Master of Arts degree in English from the University of Wisconsin, where she met and married Raymond Joseph Smith, an English educator. The following year, after beginning work on her doctorate in English, Oates inadvertently encountered one of her own stories in Margaret Foley's anthology Best American Short Stories. This discovery prompted Oates to write professionally, and in 1963 she published her first volume of short stories, By the North Gate (1963). Oates taught at the University of Detroit between 1961 and 1967. In 1967 she and her husband moved to Canada to teach at the University of Windsor, where together they founded the Ontario Review. Since leaving the University of Windsor in 1977, Oates has been writer-in-residence at Princeton University in New Jersey.

Oates's first novel, With Shuddering Fall (1964), fore-shadows her preoccupation with evil and violence in the story of a destructive romance between a teenage girl and a thirty-year-old stock car driver that ends with his death in an accident. Oates's best-known and critically acclaimed early novels form a trilogy exploring three distinct segments of American society. Critics attribute the naturalistic ambience of these works to the influence of such twentieth-century authors as William Faulkner, Theodore Dreiser, and James T. Farrell. Oates's first installment, A Garden of Earthly Delights (1967), is set in rural Eden County and chronicles the life of the daughter of a migrant worker who marries a wealthy farmer in order to provide for her illegitimate son. The woman's idyllic existence is destroyed, however, when the boy murders his stepfather and kills himself. In Expensive People (1967), the second work in the series, Oates exposes the superficial world of suburbanites whose preoccupation with material comforts reveals their spiritual poverty. The final volume in the trilogy, them (1969), which won the National Book Award for fiction, depicts the violence and degradation endured by three generations of an urban Detroit family. Critics acknowledge that Oates's experiences as a teacher in Detroit during the early 1960s contributed to her accurate rendering of the city and its social problems. Betty DeRamus stated: "Her days in Detroit did more for Joyce Carol Oates than bring her together with new people - it gave her a tradition to write from, the so-called American Gothic tradition of exaggerated horror and gloom and mysterious and violent incidents."

Oates's novels of the 1970s explore characters involved with various American professional and cultural institutions while interweaving elements of human malevolence and tragedy. Wonderland (1971), for example, depicts a brilliant surgeon who is unable to build a satisfying home life, resulting in estrangement from his wife, children, and society. Do with Me What You Will (1973) focuses upon a young attorney who is lauded by his peers for his devotion to liberal causes. The Assassins: A Book of Hours (1975) is a psychological tale which dramatizes the effects of the murder of a conservative politician on his wife and two brothers. Son of the Morning (1978) documents the rise and fall from grace of Nathan Vickery, an evangelist whose spirituality is alternately challenged and affirmed by various events in his life. Unholy Loves (1979) revolves around the lives of several faculty members of a small New York college. Considered the least emotionally disturbing of Oates's novels, Unholy Loves was praised for its indirect humor and gentle satire.

During the early 1980s, Oates published several novels that parody works by such nineteenth-century authors as Louisa May Alcott, Charles Dickens, Edgar Allan Poe, and Charlotte and Emily Bronte. Bellefleur (1980) follows the prescribed formula for a Gothic multigenerational saga, utilizing supernatural occurrences while tracing the lineage of an exploitative American family. Oates included explicit violence in this work; for example, a man deliberately crashes his plane into the Bellefleur mansion, killing himself and his family. A Bloodsmoor Romance (1982) displays such elements of Gothic romance as mysterious kidnappings and psychic phenomena in the story of five maiden sisters living in rural Pennsylvania in the late 1800s. In Mysteries of Winterthurn (1984), Oates borrowed heavily from the works of Poe as she explored the conventions of the nineteenth-century mystery novel. The protagonist of this work is a brilliant young detective who models his career after the exploits of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's fictional sleuth, Sherlock Holmes. While some critics viewed these works as whimsical, others, citing Oates's accomplished depiction of evil, maintained that they are significant literary achievements.

Oates's recent novels explore the nature and ramifications of obsession. Solstice (1985) revolves around a relationship between a young divorcee and an older woman that evolves into an emotional power struggle. In Marya: A Life (1986), a successful writer and academician attempts to locate her alcoholic mother, who had abused and later abandoned her as a child. Lives of the Twins (1987), which Oates wrote under the pseudonym of Rosamond Smith, presents a tale of love and erotic infatuation involving a woman, her lover, and her lover's twin brother. With You Must Remember This (1987), Oates returned to a naturalistic portrait of families under emotional and moral distress. Suicide attempts, violent beatings, disfiguring accidents, and incest figure prominently in this novel, which centers on an intense love affair between a former boxer and his adolescent niece. Set in Eden County and containing references to such historical events as Senator Joseph McCarthy's anti-Communist campaign, the executions of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg for conspiracy to commit espionage, and the Korean War, You Must Remember This earned high praise for its evocation of American life during the early 1950s. John Updike stated that this work "rallies all [of Oates's] strengths and is exceedingly fine - a storm of experience whose reality we cannot doubt, a fusion of fact and feeling, vision and circumstance which holds together, and holds us to it, through our terror and dismay."

Oates's works in other genres also address darker aspects of the human condition. Most critics contend that Oates's short fiction, for which she has twice received the O. Henry Special Award for Continuing Achievement, is best suited for evoking the urgency and emotional power of her principal themes. Such collections as By the North Gate; Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?: Stories of Young America (1974); The Lamb of Abyssalia (1980); and Raven's Wing (1986) contain pieces that focus upon violent and abusive relationships between the sexes. One widely anthologized story, "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?," a tale of female adolescence and sexual awakening, is considered a classic of modern short fiction and was adapted for film. Oates has also composed several dramas that were produced off-Broadway in New York and has published numerous volumes of poetry. In addition, she is a respected essayist and literary critic whose nonfiction works are praised for the logic and sensibility with which she examines a variety of subjects.

them chronicles three decades, beginning in 1937, in the life of the Wendall family. The novel "is partly made up of 'composite' characters and events, clearly influenced by the disturbances of the long hot summer of 1967," Oates acknowledges. She no longer suggests, as she did in the original author's note, that her protagonist Maureen Wendall was actually her former student. That author's note, later repudiated by Oates as a fiction in itself, describes the book as "a work of history in fictional form," and asserts that Maureen's remembrances shaped the story: "[The book] is based mainly upon Maureen's numerous recollections…. It is to her terrible obsession with her personal history that I owe the voluminous details of this novel." Although regarded as a self-contained work, them can also be considered the concluding volume in a trilogy that explores different subgroups of American society. The trilogy includes A Garden of Earthly Delights, about the migrant poor, and Expensive People, about the suburban rich. The goal of all three novels, as Oates explains in the Saturday Review, is to present a cross-section of "unusually sensitive - but hopefully representative - young men and women, who confront the puzzle of American life in different ways and come to different ends."

Further Reading

Allen, Mary, The Necessary Blankness: Women in Major American Fiction of the Sixties, University of Illinois Press, 1974.

Authors in the News, Volume 1, Gale, 1976.

Bellamy, Joe David, editor, The New Fiction: Interviews with Innovative American Writers, University of Illinois Press, 1974.

Bender, Eileen, Joyce Carol Oates, Indiana University Press, 1987.

Bloom, Harold, editor, Modern Critical Views: Joyce Carol Oates, Chelsea House, 1987.

Contemporary Literary Criticism, Gale, Volume 1, 1973, Volume 2, 1974, Volume 3, 1975, Volume 6, 1976, Volume 9, 1978, Volume 11, 1979, Volume 15, 1980, Volume 19, 1981, Volume 33, 1985.

Creighton, Joanne V., Joyce Carol Oates, G. K. Hall, 1979.

Oates, Joyce Carol (1938– ), prolific American writer, whose work includes plays, novels, stories, poetry, and literary criticism. Her first collection of short stories, By the North Gate, appeared in 1963, and since then she has published many other collections such as The Land of Abyssalia (1980) and Raven's Wing (1986), in which she has woven fairy‐tale motifs into her narratives. Other works such as Bellefleur (1980) and A Bloodsmoor Romance (1982)reflect her interest in supernatural and Gothic fiction. Her collections, Night‐Side: Eighteen Tales (1977), Haunted: Tales of the Grotesque (1994), and Demon and Other Tales (1996), include dark fantasy and weird fiction. In 1988 she published two fairy tales, ‘Blue‐Bearded Lover’ and ‘Secret Observations on the Goat Girl’ in The Assignation, and ‘The Crossing’ (1995) and ‘In the Insomniac Night’ (1997) appeared in the Ontario Review. All her fairy tales have a dreamlike quality to them and develop psychological and surprising twists to traditional narrative plots. Thus ‘Bluebeard’ is revisited from the perspective of a woman who wins his trust and will bear him children.

— Jack Zipes

(Lauren Kelly, Rosamond Smith)

Joyce Carol Oates is a prolific writer whose works include novels, short stories, criticism, plays, and poetry. Few living writers are as prolific as Oates, whose productivity has been the cause of much commentary in the world of letters. Not a year has gone by since the mid-1960s in which she has not published at least one book; occasionally as many as three have been released in a single year. As a Contemporary Novelists essayist noted, "Oates is a writer who embarks on ambitious projects; her imagination is protean; her energies and curiosity seemingly boundless; and throughout all her writing, the reader detects her sharp intelligence, spirit of inquiry, and her zeal to tell a story." Although many of her adult works feature teen-aged protagonist, in 2002 Oates addressed herself to teen readers with the novel Big Mouth and Ugly Girl, and has also published the picture books Where Is Little Reynard? and Come Meet Muffin for even younger readers. Other novels for young adults include Freaky Green Eyes and Sexy, the last a story about an emotionally confused high schooler who participates in a hoax that threatens to destroy his English teachers's career.

Born into a working-class family, Oates grew up in rural Erie County, New York, spending a great deal of time at her grandparents' farm. She attended a one-room school as a child and developed a love for reading and writing at an early age. By age fifteen, she had completed her first novel and submitted it for publication, only to discover that those who read it found it too depressing for younger readers. Oates graduated from Syracuse University in 1960 and earned her master's degree the following year at the University of Wisconsin. It was at Wisconsin that she met and married her husband, Raymond Joseph Smith, with whom she has edited the Ontario Review. The newlyweds moved to Detroit, where Oates taught at the University of Detroit between 1961 and 1967. After one of her stories was anthologized in the Best American Short Stories, she decided to devote herself to creative writing.

One of Oates's most popular and representative short stories is "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" Frequently anthologized, the story first appeared in 1966 and is considered by many to be a masterpiece of the short form. Relating the sexual awakening of a teenage girl by a mysterious older man through circumstances that assume strange and menacing proportions, it is a study in the peril that lurks beneath the surface of everyday life. With an eye to teen readers, Small Avalanches and Other Stories collects several of Oates's previously published stories for adults as well as new material. The collected twelve stories each deal with young people taking risks and dealing with the consequences that follow. As with her adult fiction, Oates maintains her dark tone; as School Library Journal reviewer Allison Follos observed, each of the tales has "a slow, deliberate, and unsettling current," while James Neal Webb noted in a BookPage.com review that the author's "trademark is her ability to tap, uncontrived, into the danger that's implicit in everyday life."

Oates explores another genre with Bellefleur, A Bloodsmoor Romance, and Mysteries of Winterthurn, which together serve as an homage to old-fashioned Gothic novels. While these novels feature many of the stock elements of conventional Gothics, including ghosts, haunted mansions, and mysterious deaths, the plots are also tied to actual events. Though fanciful in form, they are serious in purpose and examine such sensitive issues as crimes against women, children, and the poor, as well as the role of family history in shaping destiny. Bellefleur, for example, is a five-part novel that presents the saga of a rich and rapacious American family that is haunted by a family curse. Interwoven with the family's tale are real people from the nineteenth century, including abolitionist John Brown and U.S. President Abraham Lincoln, the latter who in the novel fakes his own assassination in order to escape the pressures of public life.

Oates's 1993 novel Foxfire: Confessions of a Girl Gang recounts in retrospect the destructive sisterhood of a group of teenage girls in the 1950s. The story is pieced together from former Foxfire gang member Maddy Wirtz's memories and journal and takes place in the industrial New York town of Hammond. The gang, led by the very charismatic and very angry Legs Sadovsky, directs its energy at men, the enemy force Legs perceives as responsible for the degradation and ruin of the girls' mothers and friends. The members celebrate their bond to one another by branding each others' shoulders with tattoos. However, as they lash out with sex and violence against teachers and father figures, they "become demons themselves—violent and conniving and exuberant in their victories over the opposite sex," wrote Los Angeles Times Book Review contributor Cynthia Kadohata. Acknowledging to New York Times Book Review critic Lynn Karpen that Foxfire is one of her most overtly feminist books, Oates explained that she wanted to show that although "the bond of sisterhood can be very deep and emotionally gratifying," it is a fleeting, fragile bond.

Oates' first YA novel, Big Mouth and Ugly Girl, focuses on sixteen-year-old high schoolers Matt Donaghy and Ursula Riggs. The two begin a romance after Matt's poor decision to make a joke to his friends about a school massacre results in a police investigation and Matt's ostracism by most of his classmates. Ursulla, an ungainly but capable athlete whose view of herself as ugly keeps her withdrawn from most of her fellow students, takes a public stand by coming to Matt's defense, despite the fact that she barely knows him. "Oates shows the same skill in portraying family dynamics and violence that she has in her adult fiction," commented Paula Rohrlick in her Kliatt review of the book.

Prompting several critics to compare its storyline to the events resulting in the O. J. Simpson trial of the early 1990s, Freaky Green Eyes also focuses on a teenaged girl who must make a choice about whether action is better than inaction. Francesca "Frankie" Pierson is the daughter of a wealthy but abusive sportscaster whom she idolizes. When her mother seems to intentionally provoke Frankie's father to anger by drifting away from the family, the teen becomes resentful, but after her mother disappears altogether Frankie is forced to view the relationship between her parents—as well as her own role in the dynamic of control and violence—in a new way. Praising Oates' for creating a "strong, intelligent young woman" protagonist, Kliatt reviewer Claire Rosser dubbed Freaky Green Eyes a "suspenseful story" in which the unfolding drama is "grippingly realistic." A Kirkus Reviews contributor described the novel as a "quietly gripping, beautifully written, impeccably paced psychological thriller," while in Publishers Weekly a reviewer wrote that Oates "builds the mounting tension masterfully, crafting a fast-paced narrative that will haunt readers."

While Oates plans to continue to write for teen readers, she explained to Publishers Weekly interviewer Kate Pavao that young-adult novels would not be a primary focus. "It's probably like a cook, a chef who makes a certain meal and really puts all he has into it," she explained; "then he won't make that meal again for a long time." Still, Oates continues to gravitate to teen characters in her writing for older readers; as she told Pavao, "Adults can live with compromises in a way that children and adolescents find grating. I'm just very drawn to the adolescent personality."

Career

Writer. University of Detroit, Detroit, MI, instructor, 1961-65, assistant professor, 1965-67; University of Windsor, Windsor, Ontario, Canada, member of English department faculty, 1967-78; Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, writer-in-residence, 1978-81, professor, 1987—, currently Roger S. Berlind Distinguished Professor in the Humanities.

Member

PEN, American Academy of Arts and Letters, Phi Beta Kappa.

Awards, Honors

Mademoiselle college fiction award, 1959, for "In the Old World"; National Endowment for the Arts grants, 1966, 1968; Guggenheim fellowship, 1967; O. Henry Award, 1967, for "In the Region of Ice," 1973, for "The Dead," and 1983, for "My Warszawa"; Rosenthal Award, National Institute of Arts and Letters, 1968, for A Garden of Earthly Delights; National Book Award nomination, 1968, for A Garden of Earthly Delights, and 1969, for Expensive People; National Book Award for fiction, 1970, for them; O. Henry Special Award for Continuing Achievement, 1970 and 1986; Lotos Club Award of Merit, 1975; Pushcart Prize, 1976; Notable Book designation, American Library Association, 1979, for Unholy Loves; Bellefleur nominated for a Los Angeles Times Book Prize in fiction, 1980; St. Louis Literary Award, 1988; Rhea Award for the short story, Dungannon Foundation, 1990; Alan Swallow Award for fiction, 1990; co-winner, Heidemann Award for one-act plays, 1990; Bobst Award for Lifetime Achievement in Fiction, 1990; National Book Award nomination, 1990, for Because It Is Bitter, and Because It Is My Heart; National Book Critics Circle Award nomination, and Pulitzer Prize finalist, both 1993, both for Black Water; Bram Stoker Lifetime Achievement Award for horror fiction, Horror Writers of America, 1994; best new play nomination, American Theatre Critics Association, 1994, for The Perfectionist; Pulitzer Prize finalist, 1995, for What I Lived For; Bram Stoker Award, and Fisk Fiction Prize, both 1996, both for Zombie; O. Henry Prize Story, 2001, for "The Girl with the Blackened Eye"; National Book Award, and Pulitzer Prize finalist, both 2001, both for Blonde; Best American Mystery Stories designation, 2002, for "High School Sweetheart"; Peggy V. Helmerich Distinguished Author Award, Tulsa Library Trust, 2002; Common Wealth Literature Award of Distinguished Service, PNC Financial Services Group, 2003.

Writings

For Young Adults

• Big Mouth and Ugly Girl, HarperTempest (New York, NY), 2002.
• Small Avalanches and Other Stories, HarperTempest (New York, NY), 2003.
• Freaky Green Eyes, HarperTempest (New York, NY), 2003.

For Children

• Come Meet Muffin!, illustrated by Mark Graham, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 1998.
• Where Is Little Reynard? (picture book), illustrated by Mark Graham, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 2003.

Novels

• With Shuddering Fall, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1964.
• A Garden of Earthly Delights, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1967, revised edition, Random House (New York, NY), 2003.
• Expensive People, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1967.
• them, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1969, with introduction by Greg Johnson and afterword by Oates, Modern Library (New York, NY), 2000.
• Wonderland, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1971, revised, Ontario Review Press (New York, NY), 1992.
• Do with Me What You Will, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1973.
• The Assassins: A Book of Hours, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1975.
• Triumph of the Spider Monkey: The First-Person Confession of the Maniac Bobby Gotteson as Told to Joyce Carol Oates (novella; also see below), Black Sparrow Press (Santa Barbara, CA), 1976.
• Childwold, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1976.
• Son of the Morning, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1978.
• Unholy Loves, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1979.
• Cybele, Black Sparrow Press (Santa Barbara, CA), 1979.
• Bellefleur, Dutton (New York, NY), 1980.
• Angel of Light, Dutton (New York, NY), 1981.
• A Bloodsmoor Romance, Dutton (New York, NY), 1982.
• Mysteries of Winterthurn, Dutton (New York, NY), 1984.
• Solstice, Dutton (New York, NY), 1985, revised edition, Ontario Review Press (Princeton, NJ), 2000.
• Marya: A Life, Dutton (New York, NY), 1986.
• You Must Remember This, Dutton (New York, NY), 1987.
• American Appetites, Dutton (New York, NY), 1989.
• Because It Is Bitter, and Because It Is My Heart, Dutton (New York, NY), 1990.
• I Lock My Door upon Myself, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 1990, revised edition, Ontario Review Press (Princeton, NJ), 2002.
• The Rise of Life on Earth, New Directions (New York, NY), 1991.
• Black Water, Dutton (New York, NY), 1992.
• Foxfire: Confessions of a Girl Gang, Dutton (New York, NY), 1993.
• What I Lived For, Dutton (New York, NY), 1994.
• Zombie, Dutton (New York, NY), 1995.
• Tenderness, Ontario Review Press (New York, NY), 1996.
• We Were the Mulvaneys, Dutton (New York, NY), 1996.
• First Love: A Gothic Tale, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 1996.
• Man Crazy, Dutton (New York, NY), 1997.
• My Heart Laid Bare, Dutton (New York, NY), 1998.
• Broke Heart Blues, Dutton (New York, NY), 1999.
• Blonde, HarperCollins (New York, NY), 2000.
• Middle Age: A Romance, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 2001.
• Beasts, Carroll & Graf (New York, NY), 2002.
• I'll Take You There, Ecco (New York, NY), 2002.
• The Tattooed Girl, Ecco (New York, NY), 2003.
• A Garden of Earthly Delights, Modern Library (New York, NY), 2003.
• Rape: A Love Story (novella), Carroll & Graf (New York, NY), 2003.
• The Falls, Ecco (New York, NY), 2004.
• (Under pseudonym, Lauren Kelly) Take Me, Take Me with You: A Novel of Suspense, Ecco (New York, NY), 2004.
• Sexy, HarperTempest (New York, NY), 2005.
• Uncensored: Views and (Re)views, Ecco (New York, NY), 2005.

Novels; Under Pseudonym Rosamond Smith

• Lives of the Twins, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 1988.
• Soul/Mate, Dutton (New York, NY), 1989.
• Nemesis, Dutton (New York, NY), 1990.
• Snake Eyes, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 1992.
• You Can't Catch Me, Dutton (New York, NY), 1995.
• Double Delight, Dutton (New York, NY), 1997.
• Starr Bright Will Be with You Soon, Dutton (New York, NY), 1999.
• The Barrens, Carroll & Graf (New York, NY), 2001.

Short Stories

• By the North Gate, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1963.
• Upon the Sweeping Flood and Other Stories, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1966.
• The Wheel of Love and Other Stories, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1970.
• Marriages and Infidelities, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1972.
• The Goddess and Other Women, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1974.
• Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?: Stories of Young America, Fawcett (New York, NY), 1974, published as Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?: Selected Early Stories, Ontario Review Press (Princeton, NJ), 1993, expanded edition, edited and with an introduction by Elaine Showalter, Rutgers University Press (New Brunswick, NJ), 1994.
• The Hungry Ghosts: Seven Allusive Comedies, Black Sparrow Press (Santa Barbara, CA), 1974.
• The Poisoned Kiss and Other Stories from the Portuguese, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1975.
• The Seduction and Other Stories, Black Sparrow Press (Santa Barbara, CA), 1975.
• Crossing the Border: Fifteen Tales, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1976.
• Night Side: Eighteen Tales, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1977.
• All the Good People I've Left Behind, Black Sparrow Press (Santa Barbara, CA), 1978.
• The Lamb of Abyssalia, Pomegranate (Cambridge, MA), 1980.
• A Sentimental Education, Dutton (New York, NY), 1981.
• Last Days, Dutton (New York, NY), 1984.
• Wild Nights, (limited edition), Croissant (Athens, OH), 1985.
• Raven's Wing, Dutton (New York, NY), 1986.
• The Assignation, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 1988.
• Where Is Here?, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 1992.
• Heat: And Other Stories, Plume (New York, NY), 1992.
• Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?: Selected Early Stories, Ontario Review Press (New York, NY), 1993.
• Haunted: Tales of the Grotesque, Dutton (New York, NY), 1994.
• Will You Always Love Me? and Other Stories, Dutton (New York, NY), 1995.
• The Collector of Hearts: New Tales of the Grotesque, Dutton (New York, NY), 1999.
• Faithless: Tales of Transgression, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 2001.
• I Am No One You Know: Stories, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 2004.

Poetry

• Women in Love and Other Poems, Albondacani Press (New York, NY), 1968.
• Anonymous Sins and Other Poems (also see below), Louisiana State University Press (Baton Rouge, LA), 1969.
• Love and Its Derangements (also see below), Louisiana State University Press (Baton Rouge, LA), 1970.
• Angel Fire (also see below), Louisiana State University Press (Baton Rouge, LA), 1973.
• Dreaming America (limited edition), Aloe Editions, 1973.
• Love and Its Derangements and Other Poems (includes Anonymous Sins and Other Poems, Love and Its Derangements, and Angel Fire), Fawcett (New York, NY), 1974.
• The Fabulous Beasts, Louisiana State University Press (Baton Rouge, LA), 1975.
• Season of Peril, Black Sparrow Press (Santa Barbara, CA), 1977.
• Women Whose Lives Are Food, Men Whose Lives Are Money, illustrated by Elizabeth Hansell, Louisiana State University Press (Baton Rouge, LA), 1978.
• The Stepfather (limited edition), Lord John Press (Northridge, CA), 1978.
• Celestial Timepiece (limited edition), Pressworks (Dallas, TX), 1981.
• Invisible Woman: New and Selected Poems, 1970-1972, Ontario Review Press (New York, NY), 1982.
• The Luxury of Sin (limited edition), Lord John Press (Northridge, CA), 1983.
• The Time Traveler, Dutton (New York, NY), 1989.
• Tenderness, Ontario Review Press (New York, NY), 1996.

Nonfiction

• The Edge of Impossibility: Tragic Forms in Literature, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1972.
• The Hostile Sun: The Poetry of D. H. Lawrence, Black Sparrow Press (Santa Barbara, CA), 1973.
• New Heaven, New Earth: The Visionary Experience in Literature, Vanguard Press (New York, NY), 1974.
• Contraries: Essays, Oxford University Press (Oxford, England), 1981.
• The Profane Art: Essays and Reviews, Dutton (New York, NY), 1983.
• (Woman) Writer: Occasions and Opportunities, Dutton (New York, NY), 1988.
• Conversations with Joyce Carol Oates, edited by Lee Milazzo, University Press of Mississippi (Jackson, MS), 1989.
• On Boxing, Doubleday (New York, NY), 1987, expanded edition, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 1994.
• Where I've Been, and Where I'm Going: Essays, Reviews, and Prose, Plume (New York, NY), 1999.
• The Faith of a Writer: Life, Craft, Art, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 2003.

Plays

• The Sweet Enemy, produced off-Broadway, 1965.
• Sunday Dinner, produced off-Broadway, 1970.
• Ontological Proof of My Existence, (produced off-off-Broadway, 1972), published in Partisan Review, Volume 37, 1970.
• Miracle Play, Black Sparrow Press (Santa Barbara, CA), 1974.
• Three Plays, Ontario Review Press (New York, NY), 1980.
• Presque Isle, produced in New York, NY, 1984.
• Triumph of the Spider Monkey, produced at the Los Angeles Theatre Center, 1985.
• American Holiday, produced at Los Angeles Theatre Academy, 1990.
• In Darkest America: Two Plays, Samuel French (New York, NY), 1991.
• I Stand before You Naked, (produced in New York, NY; also see below), Samuel French (New York, NY), 1991.
• How Do You Like Your Meat? (also see below), produced in New Haven, CT, 1991.
• Twelve Plays, Plume (New York, NY), 1991.
• Black, produced at the Williamstown Summer Festival, 1992.
• Gulf War, produced by the Ensemble Studio Theatre, 1992.
• The Secret Mirror, produced in Philadelphia, PA, 1992.
• The Rehearsal, produced by Ensemble Studio Theatre, 1993.
• The Perfectionist (also see below; produced in Princeton, NJ, 1993), published in The Perfectionist, and Other Plays, 1995.
• The Truth-Teller, Circle Rep Play-in-Progress, 1993.
• The Perfectionist, and Other Plays, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 1995.
• HERE SHE IS!, produced in Philadelphia, PA, 1995.
• New Plays, Ontario Review Press (New York, NY), 1998.

Editor or Compiler

• Scenes from American Life: Contemporary Short Fiction, Random House (New York, NY), 1973.
• (With Shannon Ravenel) Best American Short Stories of 1979, Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA), 1979.
• Night Walks, Ontario Review Press (New York, NY), 1982.
• First-Person Singular: Writers on Their Craft, Ontario Review Press (New York, NY), 1983.
• (With Boyd Litzinger) Story: Fictions Past and Present (textbook), Heath (Lexington, MA), 1985.
• (With Daniel Halpern) Reading the Fights: The Best Writing about the Most Controversial of Sports, Holt (New York, NY), 1988.
• The Best American Essays, Ticknor & Fields (New York, NY), 1991.
• (With Daniel Halpern) The Sophisticated Cat: A Gathering of Stories, Poems, and Miscellaneous Writings about Cats, Dutton (New York, NY), 1992.
• The Oxford Book of American Short Stories, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1992.
• George Bellows: American Artist, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 1995.
• (Author of foreword) David Robinson, Saving Graces: Images of Women in European Cemeteries, Norton (New York, NY), 1995.
• The Essential Dickinson, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 1996.
• American Gothic Tales, Plume (New York, NY), 1996.
• Story: The Art and the Craft of Narrative Fiction, Norton (New York, NY), 1997.
• The Best of H. P. Lovecraft, Ecco Press (New York, NY), 1997.
• (With R. V. Cassill) The Norton Anthology of Contemporary Fiction, Norton (New York, NY), 1997.
• (Also author of introduction) Telling Stories: An Anthology for Writers, Norton (New York, NY), 1997.
• (With Janet Berliner) Snapshots: Twentieth-Century Mother-Daughter Fiction, David R. Godine (Boston, MA), 2000.
• The Best American Essays of the Century, Houghton (Boston, MA), 2000.
• The Best New American Voices 2003, Harvest (San Diego, CA), 2002.
• Contributor of fiction, poetry, and nonfiction to periodicals, including New York Times Book Review, New York Times Magazine, New York Review of Books, New Yorker, Harper's, Times Literary Supplement, Michigan Quarterly Review, Mademoiselle, Vogue, Hudson Review, Paris Review, Grand Street, Atlantic Monthly, Poetry, and Esquire. Editor, with husband, Raymond Smith, of Ontario Review.
• Most of Oates's manuscripts, including her ongoing journal, are housed in Special Collections, Syracuse University Library.

Adaptations

Oates's short story "In the Region of Ice" was made into an Academy Award-winning short feature, c. 1970s; "Daisy" was adapted for the stage by Victoria Rue and produced off-off-Broadway, 1980; the story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" was adapted for the screen as SmoothTalk, directed by Joyce Chopra and produced by Martin Rosen, Spectrafilm, 1981; the story "Norman and the Killer" was made into a short feature; an opera based on Black Water was developed by the American Music Festival Theatre, Philadelphia, with composer John Duffy, 1996; Foxfire was adapted as a motion picture, 1996; Getting to Know You, a film based on Oates's 1992 short-story collection Heat, was released, 2000; We Were the Mulvaneys was adapted as a teleplay, Lifetime, 2002. Some of Oates's works were adapted for sound recordings, including the play Black, L.A. Theatre Works, "The Woman Who Laughed," L.A. Theatre Works, 1994, American Appetites, L.A. Theatre Works, 2000, The Best American Essays of the Century, 2001, Middle Age: A Romance, Blonde, and Big Mouth and Ugly Girl.

Biographical and Critical Sources

Books

• Authors and Artists for Young Adults, Gale (Detroit, MI), Volume 15, 1987, Volume 52, 2003.
• Bender, Eileen, Joyce Carol Oates, Indiana University Press (Bloomington, IN), 1987.
• Bloom, Harold, editor, Modern Critical Views: Joyce Carol Oates, Chelsea House (New York, NY), 1987.
• Contemporary Literary Criticism, Gale (Detroit, MI), Volume 1, 1973, Volume 2, 1974, Volume 3, 1975, Volume 6, 1976, Volume 9, 1978, Volume 11, 1979, Volume 15, 1980, Volume 19, 1981, Volume 33, 1985, Volume 52, 1989, Volume 108, 1998.
• Contemporary Novelists, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 2001.
• Contemporary Poets, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1996.
• Contemporary Popular Writers, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1997.
• Dictionary of Literary Biography, Gale (Detroit, MI), Volume 2: American Novelists since World War II, 1978, Volume 5: American Poets since World War II, 1980, Volume 130: American Short Story Writers since World War II, 1993.
• Johnson, Greg, Joyce Carol Oates: A Study of the Short Fiction, Twayne (Boston, MA), 1994.
• Johnson, Greg, Invisible Writer: A Biography of Joyce Carol Oates, Dutton (New York, NY), 1998.
• Mayer, Sigrid, and Martha Hanscom, The Reception of Joyce Carol Oates's and Gabriele Wohlmann's Short Fiction, Camden House (Columbia, SC), 1998.
• Modern American Literature, 5th edition, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1997.
• Reference Guide to American Literature, 4th edition, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1999.
• Reference Guide to Short Fiction, 2nd edition, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1999.
• St. James Guide to Horror, Ghost, and Gothic Writers, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1998.
• Short Story Criticism, Volume 6, Gale (Detroit, MI), 1990.
• Twentieth-Century Romance and Historical Writers, 2nd edition, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 1990.

Periodicals

• America, March 16, 1996, p. 18; November 17, 2003, Richard Fusco, review of A Garden of Earthly Delights, p. 19.
• American Literature, September, 1997, p. 642.
• Atlantic Monthly, October, 1969; December, 1973; September, 1997, p. 118.
• Book, March, 2001, Susan Tekulve, review of Faithless: Tales of Transgression, p. 70; May, 2001, p. 42; November-December, 2001, Beth Kephart, review of Middle Age: A Romance, p. 65.
• Booklist, April 15, 1998, Brad Hooper, review of My Heart Laid Bare, p. 1357; July, 1999, Donna Seaman, review of Where I've Been, and Where I'm Going: Essays, Reviews, and Prose, p. 1917; January 1, 2000, Donna Seaman, review of Blonde, p. 835; February 1, 2001, Donna Seaman, review of Faithless, p. 1020; July, 2001, Carol Haggas, review of Middle Age, p. 1952; October 1, 2001, Donna Seaman, review of Beasts, p. 300; August, 2002, Donna Seaman, review of I'll Take You There, p. 1886; March 1, 2003, Joanne Wilkenson, review of The Tattooed Girl, p. 1108; March 15, 2003, Hazel Rochman, review of Small Avalanches, and Other Stories, p. 1323; September 1, 2003, John Peters, review of Where Is Little Reynard?, p. 130; December 1, 2003, Ilene Cooper, review of Freaky Green Eyes, p. 660.
• Chicago Tribune Book World, September 30, 1979; July 27, 1980; January 11, 1981; August 16, 1981; February 26, 1984; August 12, 1984; January 13, 1985; February 23, 1986.
• Choice, March, 1997, p. 1160.
• Christian Century, January 13, 2004, p. 7.
• Globe and Mail (Toronto, Ontario, Canada), February 11, 1984; April 25, 1987.
• Horn Book, November-December, 2003, Roger Sutton, review of Freaky Green Eyes, p. 752; March-April, 2005, Lauren Adams, review of Sexy, p. 206.
• Kirkus Reviews, December 15, 2002, review of I'll Take You There, p. 1855; April 1, 2003, review of The Tattooed Girl, p. 501, and Where Is Little Reynard?, p. 1201; September 1, 2003, review of Freaky Green Eyes, p. 1128; February 15, 2005, review of Sexy, p. 235.
• Kliatt, July, 2003, Paula Rohrlick, review of Big Mouth and Ugly Girl, p. 25; September, 2003, Claire Rosser, review of Freaky Green Eyes, p. 10; May, 2004, Susan Allison, review of Small Avalanches, and Other Stories, p. 31; November, 2004, Janet Julian, review of Freaky Green Eyes p. 47; March, 2005, Michele Winship, review of Sexy, p. 15.
• Library Journal, August 1996, p. 113; August, 1999, Nancy Patterson Shires, review of Where I've Been, and Where I'm Going, p. 89; August, 2000, Mary Jones, review of The Best American Essays of the Century, p. 102; April 1, 2001, Caroline Mann, review of The Barrens, p. 133; July, 2001, Rebecca Bollen, review of Faithless, p. 74; August, 2001, Josh Cohen, review of Middle Age, p. 164; September 15, 2001, Rochelle Ratner, review of We Were the Mulvaneys, p. 130; October 1, 2001, review of Beasts, p. 143; September 15, 2002, Rachel Collins, review of I'll Take You There, p. 93.
• Los Angeles Times, April 2, 1981; February 18, 1986; October 13, 1986; November 7, 1986; August 7, 1987; January 31, 1988; July 21, 1988; December 9, 1988; April 16, 1990l April 15, 2003, Josh Cohen, review of The Tattooed Girl, p. 126; October 1, 2003, Marianne Orme, review of The Faith of a Writer: Life, Craft, Art, p. 75; January, 2004, Josh Cohen, review of Rape, p. 159; February 1, 2004, Joshua Cohen, review of I Am No One You Know, p. 126; March 1, 2004, Rochelle Ratner, review of The Tattooed Girl, p. 126.
• Los Angeles Times Book Review, August 12, 1980; September 19, 1982; January 8, 1984; September 30, 1984; January 6, 1985; March 1, 1987; August 16, 1987; January 15, 1989; May 10, 1992; August 22, 1993; October 22, 1995, p. 6; January 26, 2003, Stanley Crouch, "Picking up Where Faulkner Left Off," p. 3.
• Nation, July 2, 1990, pp. 27-29.
• New Leader, January-February, 2002, Brooke Allen, review of Beasts, p. 28.
• New Statesman, January 27, 2003, Vicky Hutchings, review of I'll Take You There, p. 55; January 19, 2004, Helena Echlin, review of The Tattooed Girl, p. 55.
• Newsweek, September 29, 1969; March 23, 1970; August 17, 1981; September 20, 1982; February 6, 1984; January 21, 1985; March 24, 1986; March 9, 1987; August 17, 1987; April 10, 2000, David Gates, "Goodbye, Norma Jeane," p. 76.
• New Yorker, December 6, 1969; October 15, 1973; October 5, 1981; September 27, 1982; February 27, 1984.
• New York Review of Books, December 17, 1964; January 2, 1969; October 21, 1971; January 24, 1974; October 21, 1982; August 16, 1990; December 21, 1995, p. 32; September 15, 1996, p. 11; September 21, 1997, p. 10.
• New York Times, September 5, 1967; December 7, 1968; October 1, 1969; October 16, 1971; June 12, 1972; October 15, 1973; July 20, 1980; August 6, 1981; September 18, 1982; February 10, 1984; January 10, 1985; February 20, 1986; February 10, 1987; March 2, 1987; March 4, 1987; August 10, 1987; April 23, 1988; December 21, 1988; March 30, 1990; August 29, 2003, Michiko Kakutani, "Child of Hell Is Plague on His House."
• New York Times Book Review, November 10, 1963; October 25, 1964; September 10, 1967; November 3, 1968; September 28, 1969; October 25, 1970; October 24, 1971; July 9, 1972; April 1, 1973; October 14, 1973; August 31, 1975; November 26, 1978; April 29, 1979; July 15, 1979; October 7, 1979; July 20, 1980; January 4, 1981; March 29, 1981; August 16, 1981; July 11, 1982; September 5, 1982; February 12, 1984; August 5, 1984; January 20, 1985; August 11, 1985; March 2, 1986; October 5, 1986; March 15, 1987; August 16, 1987; January 3, 1988; October 2, 1988; January 1, 1989; January 15, 1989; June 4, 1989, p. 16; May 10, 1992; August 15, 1993; February 13, 1994, p. 34; October 16, 1994, p. 7; October 8, 1995, p. 13; March 10, 1996, p. 7; March 7, 1999, Margot Livesey, "Jellyfish for Dinner Again?," p. 29; September 16, 2001, Claire Dederer, "AARP Recruits," p. 7; January 6, 2002, Amy Benfer, review of Beasts, p. 16; May 19, 2002, Lois Metzger, review of Big Mouth and Ugly Girl, p. 32; July 13, 2003, Sophie Harrison, "Now I Have Saved Her," p. 15.
• Observer (London, England), August 27, 1989.
• Publishers Weekly, June 24, 1996, p. 44; August 5, 1996, p. 430; April 20, 1998, review of My Heart Laid Bare, p. 45; May 17, 1999, review of Broke Heart Blues, p. 55; June 28, 1999, review of Where I've Been, and Where I'm Going, p. 68; February 14, 2000, review of Blonde, p. 171, "PW Talks with Joyce Carol Oates," p. 172; June 5, 2000, review of Blonde, p. 61; January 29, 2001, review of Faithless, p. 65; March 26, 2001, review of The Barrens, p. 60; August 13, 2001, review of Middle Age, p. 284; October 22, 2001, review of Beasts, p. 43; April 22, 2002, review of Big Mouth and Ugly Girl, p. 71; August 26, 2002, Rachel Collins, review of I'll Take You There, p. 93; February 10, 2003, review of Small Avalanches, and Other Stories, p. 189; April 21, 2003, review of The Tattooed Girl, p. 36; September 15, 2003, Kate Pavao, interview with Oates, p. 65, and review of Freaky Green Eyes, p. 66; November 24, 2003, review of Rape, p. 41; February 2, 2004, review of I Am No One You Know, p. 57.
• Saturday Review, October 26, 1963; November 28, 1964; August 5, 1967; October 26, 1968; November 22, 1969; October 24, 1970; June 10, 1972; November 4, 1972; August, 1981; March-April, 1985.
• School Library Journal, July, 2003, Allison Follos, review of Small Avalanches and Other Stories, p. 134; September, 2003, Amy Lilien-Harper, review of Where Is Little Reynard?, p. 186; October, 2003, Fransisca Goldsmith, review of Freaky Green Eyes, p. 174; September, 2004, Jane P. Fenn, review of Freaky Green Eyes, p. 79.
• Time, January 3, 1964; November 1, 1968; October 26, 1970; August 25, 1980; August 17,1981; October 4, 1982; February 23, 1987; August 31, 1987; January 9, 1989; April 17, 2000, Paul Gray, "The Anatomy of an Icon," p. 82.
• Times Literary Supplement, June 4, 1970; January 11, 1974; September 12, 1980; March 20, 1981; January 29, 1982; January 28, 1983; July 20, 1984; March 22, 1985; October 18, 1985; January 16, 1987; December 18, 1987; February 14, 1988; September 15, 1989; August 13, 1993, p. 19.
• Tribune Books (Chicago, IL), March 1, 1987; July 19, 1987; April 18, 1988; December 18, 1988; April 15, 1990; March 10, 1996; November 5, 1996, pp. 3, 5.
• Washington Post Book World, February 22, 1981; August 16, 1981; September 30, 1984; January 6, 1985; February 23, 1986; November 30, 1986; March 8, 1987; January 8, 1989; April 8, 1990.
• World Literature Today, autumn, 1996, pp. 959-960; winter, 2001, Rita D. Jacobs, review of Blonde, p. 115; summer, 2003, James Knudson, review of Faithless, p. 92.
• Writer, October, 2001, "Joyce Carol Oates," p. 66; January, 2004, Chuck Leddy, review of The Faith of a Writer, p. 45.
• Writer's Digest, February, 2001, Katie Struckel, "Find Identity with Joyce Carol Oates," p. 22.

Online

• BookPage.com,http://www.bookpage.com/ (September 1, 2003), James Neal Webb, review of Small Avalanches and Other Stories. *

Quotes:

"When you're 50 you start thinking about things you haven't thought about before. I used to think getting old was about vanity -- but actually it's about losing people you love. Getting wrinkles is trivial."

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

"In love there are two things -- bodies and words."

"The worst cynicism: a belief in luck."

"It is not her body that he wants but it is only through her body that he can take possession of another human being, so he must labor upon her body, he must enter her body, to make his claim."

"The television screen, so unlike the movie screen, sharply reduced human beings, revealed them as small, trivial, flat, in two banal dimensions, drained of color. Wasn't there something reassuring about it! -- that human beings were in fact merely images of a kind registered in one another's eyes and brains, phenomena composed of microscopic flickering dots like atoms. They were atoms -- nothing more. A quick switch of the dial and they disappeared and who could lament the loss?"

See more famous quotes by Joyce Carol Oates

Joyce Carol Oates
Oates in 2006.
Born	16 June 1938 (1938-06-16) (age 71) Lockport, New York
Occupation	Novelist, short story writer, playwright, poet, literary critic, professor, editor
Nationality	American
Writing period	1963-present
Notable award(s)	1967 O. Henry Award 1973 O. Henry Award 1970 National Book Award
Influences Charlotte Brontë, Emily Brontë, Lewis Carroll, Charles Dickens, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, Franz Kafka, D. H. Lawrence, Flannery O'Connor, James Joyce
Influenced Chris Bohjalian,[1] Jonathan Safran Foer, Shannon Bramer

Joyce Carol Oates (born June 16, 1938) is an American author. Raised in rural, working-class New York, Oates published her first book in 1963 and has since published over fifty novels, as well as many volumes of short stories, poetry, and non-fiction. Her novel them (1969) won the National Book Award, and her novels Black Water (1992), What I Lived For (1994), and Blonde (2000) were nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. With a reputation for prolificity, Oates has been one of the leading American novelists since the 1960s.

As of 2008, Oates is the Roger S. Berlind '52 Professor in the Humanities with the Program in Creative Writing at Princeton University, where she has taught since 1978.^[2]

Oates has also written under the pseudonyms "Rosamond Smith" and "Lauren Kelly".

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Early life and education 1.2 Literary career 1.3 Teaching career 1.4 Personal life 2 Style and themes 3 Prolificacy 4 Select awards and honors 5 Bibliography 5.1 Novels 5.2 Short story collections 5.3 Novels as "Rosamond Smith" 5.4 Novels as "Lauren Kelly" 5.5 Novellas 5.6 Drama 5.7 Essays and criticism 5.8 Poetry 5.9 Young adult fiction 5.10 Children's fiction 6 Quotes 7 External links 8 References

Biography

Early life and education

Oates was born in Lockport, New York to Carolina Oates, a homemaker, and Frederic Oates, a tool and die designer.^[3] She was raised Catholic, but is now an atheist.^[4] Oates grew up in the working-class farming community of Millersport, New York,^[5] and characterized hers as "a happy, close-knit and unextraordinary family for our time, place and economic status".^[3] Her paternal grandmother, Blanche, lived with the family and was "very close" to Joyce.^[5] After Blanche's death, Joyce learned that Blanche's father had killed himself and Blanche had subsequently concealed her Jewish heritage; Oates eventually drew on aspects of her grandmother's life in writing the 2007 novel The Gravedigger's Daughter.^[5] A brother, Fred Junior, was born in 1943, and a sister, Lynn Ann, who is severely autistic, was born in 1956.^[3]

At the beginning of her education, Oates attended the same one-room school her mother attended as a child.^[3] She became interested in reading at an early age, and remembers Blanche's gift of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland as "the great treasure of my childhood, and the most profound literary influence of my life. This was love at first sight!"^[6] In her early teens, she devoured the writing of William Faulkner, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Henry David Thoreau, Ernest Hemingway, Charlotte Brontë, and Emily Brontë, whose "influences remain very deep".^[7] Oates began writing at the age of 14, when Blanche gave her a typewriter.^[5] Oates later transferred to several bigger, suburban schools,^[3] and graduated from Williamsville South High School in 1956, where she worked for her high school newspaper.^{[citation needed]} She was the first in her family to complete high school.^[3]

Oates won a scholarship to attend Syracuse University, where she joined Phi Mu, a financially draining experience she later regretted.^[8] Oates found Syracuse "a very exciting place academically and intellectually", and trained herself by "writing novel after novel and always throwing them out when I completed them."^[9] It was not until this point that Oates began reading the work of D. H. Lawrence, Flannery O'Connor, Thomas Mann, and Franz Kafka, though, she noted, "these influences are still quite strong, pervasive."^[7] At the age of nineteen, she won the "college short story" contest sponsored by Mademoiselle. Oates graduated Syracuse as valedictorian in 1960, and received her M.A. from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1961.

Literary career

Oates published her first novel, With Shuddering Fall (1964), when she was twenty-six years old. In 1966, she published "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?", a short story dedicated to Bob Dylan and written after listening to his song "It's All Over Now, Baby Blue."^[10] The story is loosely based on the serial killer Charles Schmid, also known as "The Pied Piper of Tucson".^[11] The story was frequently anthologized and was adapted into the 1985 film Smooth Talk, starring Laura Dern. In 2008, Oates said that of all her published work, she is most noted for "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?".^[12]

Oates's novel them (1969) received the National Book Award in 1970. Since then she has published an average of two books a year. Frequent topics in her work include rural poverty, sexual abuse, class tensions, desire for power, female childhood and adolescence, and occasionally the supernatural. Violence is a constant in her work, even leading Oates to have written an essay in response to the question, "Why Is Your Writing So Violent?" She is a fan of poet and novelist Sylvia Plath, describing Plath's sole novel The Bell Jar as a "near perfect work of art"; but though Oates has often been compared to Plath, she disavows Plath's romanticism about suicide and among her characters, she favors cunning, hardy survivors, both women and men.^{[citation needed]} Oates' concern with violence and other traditionally masculine topics has won her the respect of such male authors as Norman Mailer. In the early 1980s, Oates began writing stories in the gothic and horror genres; in her foray into these genres, Oates said she was "deeply influenced" by Kafka and felt "a writerly kinship" with James Joyce.^[13] She gained much attention for her book-length essay On Boxing (1987).^{[citation needed]}

In 1996, Oates published We Were the Mulvaneys, a novel following the disintegration of an American family, which became a best-seller after being selected by Oprah's Book Club in 2001.^[12] In the 1990s and early 2000s, Oates wrote several books, mostly mystery novels, under the pen names "Rosamond Smith" and "Lauren Kelly."

For more than twenty-five years, Oates has been rumored to be a "favorite" to win the Nobel Prize in Literature by oddsmakers and critics.^[14] Her papers, held at Syracuse University, include seventeen unpublished short stories and four unpublished or unfinished novellas. Oates has said that most of her early unpublished work was "cheerfully thrown away."^[15]

Teaching career

Oates taught in Beaumont, Texas for a year before moving to Detroit in 1962, where she began teaching at the University of Detroit. Influenced by the Vietnam war, the 1967 Detroit race riots, and a job offer, in 1968 Oates moved with her husband to teaching positions at the University of Windsor, Canada.^[3] In 1978, she moved to Princeton and began teaching at Princeton University.

In 1995, Princeton undergraduate Jonathan Safran Foer took an introductory writing course with Oates,^[16] who took an interest in Foer's writing, telling him that he had "that most important of writerly qualities, energy".^[17] Foer later recalled that "she was the first person to ever make me think I should try to write in any sort of serious way. And my life really changed after that."^[17] Oates served as the advisor to Foer's senior thesis, an early version of his novel Everything Is Illuminated, which was published to wide acclaim in 1999.^[16]

Personal life

While studying at the University of Wisconsin–Madison, Oates met Raymond J. Smith, a fellow graduate student, whom she married in 1961.^[5] Smith became a professor of 18th-century literature, and later an editor and publisher. Together the couple founded The Ontario Review, a literary magazine, in 1974, on which Oates served as associate editor.^[18] In 1980, Oates and Smith founded Ontario Review Books, an independent publishing house. In 2004, Oates described the partnership as "a marriage of like minds—both my husband and I are so interested in literature and we read the same books; he'll be reading a book and then I'll read it—we trade and we talk about our reading at meal times[...]it's a very collaborative and imaginative marriage".^[3] Smith died of complications from pneumonia on February 18, 2008.^[18] In April 2008, Oates wrote to an interviewer, "Since my husband's unexpected death, I really have very little energy[...]My marriage—my love for my husband—seems to have come first in my life, rather than my writing. Set beside his death, the future of my writing scarcely interests me at the moment."^[19] In early 2009 Oates became engaged to, and married, Professor Charles Gross of the Psychology Department and Neuroscience Institute at Princeton.^[20]

Oates is devoted to running, and has written that, "[i]deally, the runner who's a writer is running through the land- and cityscapes of her fiction, like a ghost in a real setting."^[21] While running, Oates mentally envisions scenes in her novels and works out structural problems in already-written drafts; she formulated the germ of her novel You Must Remember This (1987) while running, when she "glanced up and saw the ruins of a railroad bridge", which reminded her of "a mythical upstate New York city".^[21]

In 1973, Oates began keeping a detailed journal documenting her personal and literary life; it eventually grew to "more than 4,000 single-spaced typewritten pages".^[22] In 2008, Oates said she had "moved away from keeping a formal journal" and instead preserves copies of her e-mails.^[19] Oates is a member of the Board of Trustees of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. She is also a member of Mensa.^[23]

Style and themes

From her first novel With Shuddering Fall in 1964, up to Kindred Passions in 1987, Oates built up a literary corpus that mixes Gothic estrangement with high social observation. Her works contain the typical elements of this type of tale: unconscious forces, seduction, incest, violence, and rape, sometimes to the point of sensationalism. She has written in a variety of genres, eras and landscapes—thus, she has works settled in a Faulkner-like Eden County, an imaginary area of upstate New York; in academia; in the Detroit slums and the Pennsylvania backwoods. But her works are not mere renderings of unusual experiences in far away places, both in space and time: novels such as A Bloodsmoor Romance, The Mysteries of Wintherthurn and Kindred Passions contain strong feminist overtones and use of the Gothic device to explore the ambiguities of gender and the sexual bases of fantasy.

Prolificacy

Oates writes in longhand,^[24] working from "8 till 1 every day, then again for two or three hours in the evening."^[14] Her subsequent prolificacy has become one of her best-known attributes; The New York Times wrote in 1989 that Oates's "name is synonymous with productivity",^[25] and in 2004, The Guardian noted that "Nearly every review of an Oates book, it seems, begins with a list [of the number of books she has published]".^[3] Critics have frequently criticized Oates for the level of her output.

In a journal entry written in the 1970s, Oates sarcastically addressed her critics, writing, "So many books! so many! Obviously JCO has a full career behind her, if one chooses to look at it that way; many more titles and she might as well... what?...give up all hopes for a 'reputation'?[...]but I work hard, and long, and as the hours roll by I seem to create more than I anticipate; more, certainly, than the literary world allows for a 'serious' writer. Yet I have more stories to tell, and more novels[...]".^[26] In The New York Review of Books in 2007, Michael Dirda suggested that disparaging criticism of Oates "derives from reviewer's angst: How does one judge a new book by Oates when one is not familiar with most of the backlist? Where does one start?"^[14]

Several publications have published lists of what they deem the best Joyce Carol Oates books, designed to help introduce readers to the author's daunting oeuvre. In a 2003 article titled "Joyce Carol Oates for dummies", The Rocky Mountain News recommended starting with her early short stories and the novels A Garden of Earthly Delights (1967), them (1969), Wonderland (1971), Black Water (1992), and Blonde (2000).^[27] In 2006, The Times listed them, On Boxing (1987), Black Water, and High Lonesome: New & Selected Stories, 1966-2006 (2006) as "The Pick of Joyce Carol Oates".^[28] In 2007, Entertainment Weekly listed their Oates "favorites" as Wonderland, Black Water, Blonde, I'll Take You There (2002), and The Falls (2004).^[29] In 2003, Oates herself said that she thinks she will be remembered for, and would most want a first-time Oates reader to read, them and Blonde, though she added that "I could as easily have chosen a number of titles."^[30]

Select awards and honors

Winner:

• 2007: American Humanist Association's Humanist of the Year
• 2006: Chicago Tribune Literary Prize^[31]
• 2005: Prix Femina Etranger - The Falls
• 2001: Oprah's Book Club - We Were the Mulvaneys^[32]
• 1996: PEN/Malamud Award for Excellence in the Art of the Short Story
• 1996: Boston Book Review's Fisk Fiction Prize - Zombie
• 1996: Bram Stoker Award for Novel - Zombie
• 1990: Rea Award for the Short Story
• 1990: Heidemann Award for one-act plays - Tone Clusters, co-winner
• 1973: O. Henry Award - "The Dead"
• 1970: National Book Award - them
• 1968: M. L. Rosenthal Award, National Institute of Arts and Letters - A Garden of Earthly Delights
• 1967: O. Henry Award - "In the Region of Ice"
• 1959: Mademoiselle college fiction award - In the Old World

Nominated:

• 2009: Man Booker International Prize- Lifetime Achievement Award^[33]
• 2007: National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction - The Gravedigger's Daughter^[34]
• 2007: National Book Critics Circle Award for Autobiography - The Journals of Joyce Carol Oates, 1973-1982^[34]
• 2006: Orange Prize For Fiction Longlist - Rape: A Love Story
• 2001: Pulitzer Prize - Blonde
• 2000: National Book Award - Blonde^[35]
• 1995: Pulitzer Prize - What I Lived For
• 1995: PEN/Faulkner Award - What I Lived For^[36]
• 1993: Pulitzer Prize - Black Water^[37]
• 1992: National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction - Black Water^[38]
• 1990: National Book Award - Because It Is Bitter, and Because It Is My Heart ^[39]
• 1972: National Book Award - Wonderland ^[40]
• 1969: National Book Award - Expensive People ^[41]
• 1968: National Book Award - A Garden of Earthly Delights ^[42]

Bibliography

Novels

• With Shuddering Fall (1964)
• A Garden of Earthly Delights (1967)
• Expensive People (1968)
• them (1969)
• Wonderland (1971)
• Do with Me What You Will (1973)
• The Assassins: A Book of Hours (1975)
• Childwold (1976)
• Son of the Morning (1978)
• Cybele (1979)
• Unholy Loves (1979)
• Bellefleur (1980)
• Angel of Light (1981)
• A Bloodsmoor Romance (1982)
• Mysteries of Winterthurn (1984)
• Solstice (1985)
• Marya: A Life (1986)
• You Must Remember This (1987)
• American Appetites (1989)
• Because It Is Bitter, and Because It Is My Heart (1990)
• Foxfire: Confessions of a Girl Gang (1993) (the basis for the 1996 film Foxfire)
• What I Lived For (1994)
• Zombie (1995)
• We Were the Mulvaneys (1996)
• Man Crazy (1997)
• My Heart Laid Bare (1998)
• Broke Heart Blues (1999)
• Blonde (2000)
• Middle Age: A Romance (2001)
• I'll Take You There (2002)
• The Tattooed Girl (2003)
• The Falls (2004)
• Missing Mom (2005)
• Black Girl / White Girl (2006)
• The Gravedigger's Daughter (2007)
• My Sister, My Love (2008)
• Little Bird of Heaven (2009)
• A Fair Maiden (Forthcoming)
• The Crosswicks Horror (Forthcoming)

Short story collections

• By the North Gate (1963)
• Upon the Sweeping Flood And Other Stories (1966)
• The Wheel of Love And Other Stories (1970)
  • How I Contemplated The World From The Detroit House Of Correction
  • Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?
• Marriages and Infidelities (1972)
• The Goddess and Other Women (1974)
• The Hungry Ghosts: Seven Allusive Comedies (1974)
• The Poisoned Kiss And Other Stories from the Portuguese (1975)
• The Seduction & Other Stories (1975)
• Crossing the Border: Fifteen Tales (1976)
• Night-Side (1977)
• All the Good People I've Left Behind (1979)
• A Sentimental Education: Stories (1980)
• Last Days: Stories (1984)
• Wild Saturday (1984)
• Raven's Wing: Stories (1986)
• The Assignation: Stories (1989)
• Oates In Exile (1990)
• Heat And Other Stories (1991)
• Where Is Here? (1992)
• Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?: Selected Early Stories (1993)
• Haunted: Tales of the Grotesque (1994)
• I, the Juror (1995)
• Demon and other tales (1996)
• Will You Always Love Me? And Other Stories (1996)
• The Collector of Hearts: New Tales of the Grotesque (1998)
• Faithless: Tales of Transgression (2001)
• I Am No One You Know: Stories (2004)
• The Female of the Species: Tales of Mystery and Suspense (2006)
• High Lonesome: New & Selected Stories, 1966-2006 (2006)
• The Museum of Dr. Moses: Tales of Mystery and Suspense (2007)
• The Temple (1996)
• Wild Nights! (2008)
• Life After High School
• Dear Husband, (2009)

Novels as "Rosamond Smith"

• Lives of the Twins (1987) (U.K. title: Kindred Passions)
• Soul/Mate (1989)
• Nemesis (1990)
• Snake Eyes (1992)
• You Can't Catch Me (1995)
• Double Delight (1997)
• Starr Bright Will Be With you Soon (1999)
• The Barrens (2001)

Novels as "Lauren Kelly"

• Take Me, Take Me With You (2003)
• The Stolen Heart (2005)
• Blood Mask (2006)

Novellas

• The Triumph of the Spider Monkey (1976)
• I Lock My Door Upon Myself (1990)
• The Rise of Life on Earth (1991)
• Black Water (1992)
• First Love: A Gothic Tale (1996)
• Beasts (2002)
• Rape: A Love Story (2003)
• The Corn Maiden : A Love Story (2005)

Drama

• Miracle Play (1974)
• Three Plays (1980)
• In Darkest America (1991)
• I Stand Before You Naked (1991)
• Twelve Plays (1991) (including Black)
• The Perfectionist and Other Plays (1995)
• New Plays (1998)
• Dr. Magic: Six One Act Plays (2004)

Essays and criticism

• The Edge of Impossibility: Tragic Forms in Literature (1972)
• The Hostile Sun: The Poetry of D.H. Lawrence (1974)
• New Heaven, New Earth: The Visionary Experience in Literature (1974)
• Contraries: Essays (1981)
• The Profane Art: Essays & Reviews (1983)
• On Boxing (1987)
• (Woman) Writer: Occasions and Opportunities (1988)
• George Bellows: American Artist (1995)
• "They Just Went Away" 1995
• Where I've Been, And Where I'm Going: Essays, Reviews, and Prose (1999)
• The Faith of A Writer: Life, Craft, Art (2003)
• Uncensored: Views & (Re)views (2005)

Poetry

• Women In Love and Other Poems (1968)
• Anonymous Sins & Other Poems (1969)
• Love and Its Derangements (1970)
• Angel Fire (1973)
• The Fabulous Beasts (1975)
• Women Whose Lives Are Food, Men Whose Lives Are Money (1978)
• Invisible Woman: New and Selected Poems, 1970-1982 (1982)
• The Time Traveler (1989)
• Tenderness (1996)
• The Coming Storm (Forthcoming)

Young adult fiction

• Big Mouth & Ugly Girl (2002)
• Small Avalanches and Other Stories (2003)
• Freaky Green Eyes (2003)
• Sexy (2005)
• After the Wreck, I Picked Myself Up, Spread My Wings, and Flew Away (2006)

Children's fiction

• Come Meet Muffin! (1998)
• Where Is Little Reynard? (2003)

Quotes

• "I come from people who did not go to college. They didn't even finish high school. People who one might call ordinary Americans who are very hard-working."
• "I'm drawn to failure. I feel that I'm contending with it constantly in my own life."
• "Boxing is a celebration of the lost religion of masculinity all the more trenchant for its being lost."
• "The brain is a muscle" from Love and Its Derangements (1970)
• "Revenge is living well, without you."

External links

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Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Joyce Carol Oates

Papers

• Papers of Joyce Carol Oates at Syracuse University

Biographies:

• Heath Anthology of American Literature Biography
• Bartleby biography
• Literary Encyclopedia
• Biography of Joyce Carol Oates
• Joyce Carol Oates at Internet Book List

Websites:

• Celestial Timepiece: A Joyce Carol Oates Home Page - Authoritative web site on Oates, from a reference librarian at the University of San Francisco

Interviews and Speeches:

• Joyce Carol Oates to graduates: we do love our students- Boston Globe
• NPR 2001 Interview
• NPR 2008 Interview
• PBS Interview

Miscellaneous:

• Works by or about Joyce Carol Oates in libraries (WorldCat catalog)

References

1. ^ "What Authors Influenced You?", Authorsontheweb.com. Retrieved on 2007-07-10.
2. ^ The Program in Creative Writing, Princeton University
3. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i} Edemariam, Aida. "The new Monroe doctrine", The Guardian, 2004-09-04. Retrieved on 2008-10-29.
4. ^ Oates, Joyce Carol. "Humanism and Its Discontents", The Humanist, November-December 2007.
5. ^ ^{a b c d e} Reese, Jennifer. "Joyce Carol Oates gets personal", Entertainment Weekly, 2007-07-13.
6. ^ Oates (2003.) The Faith of a Writer. p. 14.
7. ^ ^{a b} Milazzo, Lee, ed. Conversations with Joyce Carol Oates. University Press of Mississippi, 1989. 143.
8. ^ Oates, Joyce Carol. "Lowest Ebb: Bound", The New Yorker, 2002-04-22. Retrieved on 2008-10-30.
9. ^ Phillips, Robert. "The Art of Fiction No. 72: Joyce Carol Oates" (interview), The Paris Review 74, Fall-Winter 1978.
10. ^ "Dedication Of Joyce Carol Oates Short Story To Dylan". http://www.edlis.org/twice/threads/joyce_carol_oates_dedication.html. 
11. ^ "Charles Schmid, The Pied Piper of Tucson". CourtTV Crime Library. http://www.crimelibrary.com/serial_killers/predators/schmid/oates_9.html. 
12. ^ ^{a b} Truman, Cheryl. "Author Joyce Carol Oates is always at her finest" (reprint), Lexington Herald-Leader, 2008. Retrieved on 2008-10-29.
13. ^ HorrorOnline Author Focus: Joyce Carol Oates 1999
14. ^ ^{a b c} Dirda, Michael. ""The Wand of the Enchanter", The New York Review of Books 54.20, 2007-12-20. Retrieved on 2008-10-29.
15. ^ ""The Madness of Scholarship"". Kennesaw: The Magazine of Kennesaw State College. 1993. http://jco.usfca.edu/madness.html. 
16. ^ ^{a b} Nash, Margo. "Learning to Write From the Masters", The New York Times, 2002-12-01. Retrieved on 2008-10-29.
17. ^ ^{a b} Birnbaum, Robert. "Jonathan Safran Foer: Author of Everything is Illuminated talks with Robert Birnbaum", IdentityTheory.com, 2006-05-26. Retrieved on 2008-10-29.
18. ^ ^{a b} "Raymond Smith, 77, Founder and Editor of Literary Journal", The New York Times, 2008-02-27. Retrieved on 2008-10-29.
19. ^ ^{a b} Smalldon, Jeffrey. "End of story?: Joyce Carol Oates takes stock as she approaches 70", The Columbus Dispatch, 2008-04-06. Retrieved on 2008-10-30.
20. ^ http://crossingtheborder.wordpress.com/2009/05/04/married/
21. ^ ^{a b} Oates, Joyce Carol. "Writers on Writing: To Invigorate Literary Mind, Start Moving Literary Feet", The New York Times, 1999-07-18. Retrieved on 2008-10-30.
22. ^ Campbell, James. "The Oates Diaries", The New York Times, 2007-10-07. Retrieved on 2008-10-30.
23. ^ Folse, Molly. "The Mensans and Me: Intelligence and perception put to the test at American Mensa's Annual Gathering." Birmingham Weekly October 25-November 1, 2007. [1]
24. ^ Birnbaum, Robert. "Personalities: Birnbaum v. Joyce Carol Oates", The Morning News, 2005-02-03. Retrieved on 2008-10-30.
25. ^ "The more they write, the more they write", The New York Times, 1989-07-30. Retrieved on 2008-10-29.
26. ^ Johnson, Greg, ed. The Journal of Joyce Carol Oates: 1973-1982. New York: Ecco, 2007. 331.
27. ^ Davis, Duane. "Joyce Carol Oates for dummies", "Where to start", "Onto the novels" (series of articles), The Rocky Mountain News, 2003-06-13. Retrieved on 2008-10-29.
28. ^ Freeman, John. "Joyce Carol Oates, up close and personal", The Times, 2007-08-11. Retrieved on 2008-10-28.
29. ^ "Book News: Daily Oates Consumption", Entertainment Weekly, 2007-07-06. Retrieved on 2008-10-29.
30. ^ "Off the Page: Joyce Carol Oates", The Washington Post, 2003-10-24. Retrieved on 2008-10-29.
31. ^ http://www.chfestival.org/fest2006/index.cfm?fa=home.program&id=1236&sec=adult
32. ^ Joyce Carol Oates' book, "We Were the Mulvaneys."
33. ^ http://www.themanbookerprize.com/prize/mbi-archive/43
34. ^ ^{a b} Ccritcal Mass The 2007 National Book Critics Circle Award Finalists
35. ^ The National Book Foundation
36. ^ Folger Shakespeare Library
37. ^ http://jco.usfca.edu/awards.html
38. ^ The National Book Critics Circle
39. ^ The National Book Foundation
40. ^ Joyce Carol Oates - Wonderland
41. ^ The National Book Foundation
42. ^ The National Book Foundation

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