Art Is The Highest Expression Of The

Why The Need, Rising In Some Very Nearly To The Level Of Compulsion, To Verify Experience By Way Of Language?-to Scrupulously Record And Preserve The Very Passing Of Time?

I Don't Teach Literature From My Perspective As 'joyce Carol Oates.' I Try To Teach Fiction From The Perspective Of Each Writer. If I'm Teaching A Story By Hemingway, My Endeavor Is To Present The Story That Hemingway Wrote In Its Fullest Realization.

How Fascinating To A Child Are Words: The Shapes, Sounds, Textures And Mysterious Meanings Of Words; The Way Words Link Together Into Elastic Patterns Called "sentences." And These Sentences Into Paragraphs, And Beyond.

I Work Very Slowly. It's Like Building A Ladder, Where You're Building Your Own Ladder Rung By Rung, And You're Climbing The Ladder. It's Not The Best Way To Build A Ladder, But I Don't Know Any Other Way.

There Was A Greek Philosopher Who Taught That, Of All Things, Not To Have Been Born Is The Sweetest State. But I Believe Sleep Is The Sweetest State. You're Dead, Yet Alive. There's No Sensation So Exquisite.