I’m reading about the makings of one of modern fiction’s most prolific writers, Joyce Carol Oates. Oates has written more than fifty-six novels, thirty collections of short stories, eight volumes of poetry, too many essays and book reviews to count, and many long nonfiction works all while teaching at Princeton for thirty-five years.
With those many accomplishments to her credit, you’d think Oates might be ready for a break. Not so. She still writes in longhand from 8:00 a.m. until 1:00 p.m. every day and then returns to her writing desk for another three hours in the evening. Think about all the stories we could write keeping that kind of a schedule.
Oates’ book, The Lost Landscape: A Writer’s Coming of Age, is interesting, but I’m not sure what to make of it yet. Oates combines a collection of essays, some previously published, to tell the story of her unstoppable curiosity, the people of her early years, and even one story written from the perspective of her pet chicken named Happy Chicken.
Take a glance at this review of The Lost Landscape by Joyce Carol Oates by BookPage and see what you think.
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