The Journal of Joyce Carol Oates

by Joyce Carol Oates

  November 7, 1982.…Lovely brightly-cold autumn day. Much sunshine. Chill. I sit here amidst notes & scraps of God-knows-what & feel “untouched & innocent as a lamb.”…The queer disparity between what we know of ourselves and what the world imagines it knows. A subject I won’t delve into since it is too commonplace. But it was powerfully evoked the other day when I was so generously applauded…and “made much of”…at the Twentieth-Century Women Writers Conference at Hofstra…. Told deadpan that I was the outstanding American writer. My hand much shaken, all sorts of (improbable?) praise…. Awash in which I feel obliged to say, But you should know all the ways in which I’ve failed, you should take into consideration the assessments of my detractors, who are, as the expression would have it, Legion. Am I participating in a bizarre form of dishonesty by not saying such things?—by standing in silence?—smiling?—waiting for it to pass? Manipulative flattery I can handle, that blatant sort of thing, but this other, which seems sincere, and is in any case disinterested…all very odd, odd.

  …My address “The Faith of a (Woman) Writer,” at Hofstra, Nov. 4. Elaine & I drove over to Long Island, leaving fairly early in the morning (8 A.M.): my talk; lunch; Elaine’s paper (“The Dead” and Feminist Criticism); a deft return home, by 5 P.M., avoiding receptions, a dinner, etc. But the visit was really quite splendid. And though I don’t “bask” in adulation it struck me hard, the next day, that perhaps I should attempt to value it…since I seem to take the other, the loathing, the vituperative, so much to heart. (I mean that I am more inclined to believe it since I know myself from within and know how hard, how painfully hard, how slow, how sluggish, how piteous it can be, my “writerly” process…. Typing & retyping a page five times or more. These slow curlicue layers. And all very frustrating since, in any case, the novel—Winterthur, that is—is already too long. I note that I have written 645 pages thus far and have at least six chapters to go. And production costs being what they are, what am I to do!—except continue, continue, allowing the novel to fill whatever space it will, in defiance of economic fate.)

  …Thus, by writing longer novels, I am doomed to making less money for 1983, 1984, and—? Perhaps there’ll be no paperback sale at all for Crosswicks. (My amazement to learn that the diminished $50,000 for Bloodsmoor is actually a good price in today’s reprint market. But it isn’t very good set beside $345,000 for Bellefleur. Now I must ask myself—do I care?—do I really care? I suppose I must not, since I have the option of publishing the much shorter Jigsaw next; but prefer Crosswicks. So it will be Crosswicks,* for better & for worse—most likely worse…. For even those reprint editors who “loved” Bloodsmoor couldn’t afford it; and it’s difficult to imagine anyone “loving” Crosswicks.)

  …Reading Wells’ scientific romances, as they are called—The Time Machine, The Invisible Man, The Island of Dr. Moreau, etc. Dipping into Hawthorne’s American Notebooks frequently. Last night, a large amiable gathering at the Keeleys’ & dinner afterward with Elaine and English…. […] Our ginger kitten lies curled up asleep at my feet. A lovely long uneventful day ahead. Work on Winterthur which I love so much it very nearly frightens me…the prospect of ending it is too terrible to contemplate…. And yet, I only began writing it, really writing it, in May. Before that, weeks of tiresome battering & hammering & doodling & sighing & staring out the window, to no avail. It’s that husk-like state I dread. To be forever in medias res….

  November 25, 1982. Thansgiving…. And a lovely brightly-cold day it is. And nothing planned. And my revisions of Winterthur so smooth & so minor (since I’ve been revising all along) the novel feels completed; the author is being excluded; a phase of my life (and of Life) is finished—for better, as they say, or for worse. But finished. But—why not be more subtle?—another phase at once begun, no less worthy.

  …(These queer comical contradictory impulses. To worry that a long novel won’t be completed, that something will happen—whether a catastrophe from the “outside world,” or from the inner; then to worry that one is wasting time, killing time, misusing time, being denied the solace of Time Well Spent—when the long project is at last concluded; and smaller things attended to. Contrary impulses. One can recognize their comical nature yet be baffled as to how to circumvent them. Transcend? Unify?)….

  …At the heart of the impassioned literary enterprise there must sound a small plaintive/angry voice that declares, Now, with this, I will prove myself: and having “proved myself”—will I not therefore be immortal? But the voice has gone silent in JCO, I fear. First of all—neither Crosswicks nor Winterthur will make any substantial difference to my life, or my reputation: long and unwieldy as they are, no paperback house will want them very much, and I’ll be fortunate to get any reprint bid at all; then, more seriously (more childishly?) these “genre” works will be misread by critics who dislike me, and dismissed as slovenly, violent, unformed, tiresome, boring, offensive, etc., no matter how hard I have worked on them. For once certain labels are applied, one simply cannot escape them; of course, sympathetic critics and readers might argue against them, hoping for some “controversy” of their own—if they are writers; but I’d be inordinately realistic to think that JCO can ever overcome the fictitious “JCO” in certain obdurate imaginations.

  […]

  …Ah, lovely myriad-minded Princeton! Last night we celebrated a kind of oblique Thanksgiving with the Showalters & the Goldmans; yesterday, Mike Keeley took me to lunch in the splendid sun-shiny all-glass dining room at Prospect, overlooking (Mrs. Ellen Wilson’s) old garden, celebratory too—Thanksgiving, & Mike’s new contract with Simon & Schuster, based upon that section of his novel which I’d read & liked, last summer.

  […]

  November 29, 1982. […] For once, behaving wisely, Ray and I have succeeded, or at least we think we have, in warding off severe attacks of flu. Staying home instead of going out; keeping warm, more or less; taking liquids, etc., etc…. For a day and a half I was lying on the sofa here, beneath a quilt, reading submissions for the magazine & Middlemarch & diverse poets like Ashbery, Chuck Wright. Taking notes in a desultory manner for short stories…. While Ray is reading Winterthur: our experiment is to gauge his reaction to the “mystery-detective” element; but in fact his intelligent comments and (evidently unfeigned) enthusiasm have been wonderfully gratifying. To sit at dinner, at lunch, with so attentive a reader!…it’s remarkable, really; and extremely helpful. Since Ray did not pick up one or two “clues” in the first section, it will be interesting to see if Elaine picks them up. If not, perhaps the clues are too obscure…. My amateur’s sense of this kind of fiction is that its degree of complexity or obscurity determines its audience. Those who regularly read mysteries are sharp-eyed and demanding, those who never read them less so, and it’s this latter group I hope to appeal to…. In any case it’s a delightful experience to have Ray read the novel as he is, and discuss it with me. He has made no suggestions for changes, he thinks it is well-paced, in fact he thinks it is brilliantly done…but then, like my mother and father, he seems to be stuck with me; and is perhaps somewhat prejudiced in my favor.

  …Vague notions for stories that don’t resolve themselves into images or voices. “For I Will Consider My Cat….”* I don’t want this story to dwindle into a mere anecdote, a satirical sort of fling; then again, it is funny…in a way. But I don’t have the voice. But—why don’t I have the voice? Because I don’t have it. The voice. The voice eludes me. […] Tomorrow I will be reading at the U. of Delaware. In looking through recent short stories I came upon “Last Days” and spent some time rereading it…. I seem to recall that I had difficulty writing “Last Days”…? But it reads quite well; I suppose I should confess that I’m pleased with it; and envious, that I could write so powerfully then. Because at the moment I seem capable only of revising. Which I could do, I’m afraid, forever…. (& now I understand the sentiment of those who have so famously revised, like Nabokov, Flannery O’Connor, Joyce. The original “creative idea” is actuall
y a rarity; one can’t in a way summon it. As for writing, rewriting, etc., etc., again & again typing a page over, as I’ve done so thoroughly/repetitively w/my recent novels—it doesn’t take inspiration or genius or talent to do that, but only time.)

  December 4, 1982. […] A gray featureless day. Drizzle. Unusually warm for December. Working here in our guest room, our white airy glassy “new” room. A page or two, a break at the piano, another page, the story moving along with customary slowness. How sad, how degrading, how inevitable, how…human…to be writing in a “contemporary” achromatic style, a little flat, a little droll/sardonic/knowing…after the extravagance of Winterthur. To think that I can’t hear that voice again…enter into that imaginative conceit again…the marvelous fantasy of Xavier…the “detective-hero.”…To think that I’m expelled…. (I must sound very odd indeed. Yet I don’t feel odd to myself. It’s as if…as if…what is it…shifting from a technicolored world to a black-and-white world…. Walking on the ground again. The flat-footed ground.)

  …Charlotte Brontë spoke of living almost wholly in her imagination, after the deaths of Emily, Branwell, and Anne. Writing Shirley at the time. (Shirley—which isn’t, to my way of thinking, remarkably “imaginative.”) She thanks God for having given her the solace of her writing, her imagination…. The reality I seem to find inadequate—but do I find it actually inadequate?—I really don’t know—this reality—“life”—strikes me as wonderfully rich & provocative. But it can’t be contained in a structure or rendered through language. & language is the element of inestimable beauty…. The narrative’s strategy as well. How lovely, how…lasting. (It’s the perishable nature of “reality” that disappoints. All very gripping, yes, but it isn’t quite enough.)…In this phase of my writing life I want to circumnavigate the psychic distress of being-between-worthy-projects, which I remember only too clearly from last year. I had finished Crosswicks and wanted desperately to begin Winterthur long before it was ready to be written. I had no language, no narrator, no real sense of Xavier and the others…. Utter folly; and I spent some wretched days; knowing at the time how foolish I was, yet unable to get free of the obsession. […] The investigation of the mind’s eye, the convolutions of the soul, what else is of profound interest? Even “For I Will Consider My Cat Jeoffry” which I take to be a minor story, on this first day of writing, even this, can’t it become transformed…somehow?…by my willingness to put everything I know into it????? (But it will be minor. And why should I resist? I can’t always be writing a novel. I can’t always be having a fascinating conversation with a friend; or teaching a lively class; or reading an excellent book. One must come down from these heights…it’s only reasonable. I will myself to be reasonable from now on.)

  […]

  December 18, 1982. […] Working still, slowly & painstakingly, here in the “guest room.” Winterthur is completed; my heart yearns for—; but no matter; the days pass, December 21 approaches, the shortest day/longest night of the year; I’ve lived through these queer spasms of the soul before & daresay I will again. Have spent much of the past week on “The Seasons.”* A strange, cruel, yet (I suppose) liberating story. In the sense in which the female character is “liberated.”…At any rate, no longer content to remain a victim. (Much familiar material here. The kittens/cats primarily. But I think I avoided sentimentality.) […] I feel idle, groggy, my head ringing with the laconic deadpan language of “The Seasons.” Why do I write such stories? Do they illuminate my soul? Or someone else’s? What is the origin (let alone the purpose, the destination) of art? Radiant pockets here and there, mysterious crevices. In a way I know less than I did at the age of twenty, writing the queer intransigent “tales” of By the North Gate. And should I live to be sixty, why then…what kinship with this Joyce, fretting & revising hour upon hour to compose short fictions no one will much like…?

  December 31, 1982.…A cold overcast afternoon shading imperceptibly into dusk. Much activity in a short while, however—our communal New Year’s Eve party at the Weisses’. (Elaine, however, is ill with a serious ear infection and won’t be coming. The Goldmans, in NYC, won’t be coming either. Mike Keeley is in Cambodia, Stephen Koch probably can’t come…. So our closest friends won’t be here, unfortunately.)

  …Lovely quiet days lately. I’ve had time to work for hours on end…short stories primarily…some pen-and-ink drawings (particularly relevant to these stark black-on-gray-on-white winter days: winter trees, winter pond, and the like). It seems to me that I have been inactive, even rather lazy, but it’s that time of year […].

  …Shopping at the Pennington Market. Late-afternoon customers, drivers, a sense of impatience, pre–New Year’s Eve suspension. Ray’s bad cold of two days has lifted at last. My near-flu lifted without actually descending. (Thinking of Elaine and Stephen and other friends, and their diverse ailments, I’m forced to conclude that thus far Ray and I are amazingly healthy people. Colds, mild cases of the flu…. No days lost re. teaching in how many years?…probably about fifteen. Which is remarkable considering that one really ought to have sick-days now and then: there’s something zealous and Girl Scoutish about not.)

  …Nice letter from Robert Brustein of the American Repertory Theater. “I admire your work extremely,” he says. Is he serious? What work? Surely not plays…. I admire your work extremely, Mr. Brustein, what I’ve seen of it in TNR: brilliantly savage reviews, the kind of throwaway lines (Stanley Kauffmann displays them too) other writers presumably struggle over…. Preparing copy, etc., for The Profane Art. A book which quietly pleases me. No prizes in store, no awards, modest readership indeed; not even many reviews (which can be a blessing for me, these days); but it’s a solid enough book, assembled over a period of years, much of it rewritten. There is comfort, solace, satisfaction in small things. (After the relative disappointment—commercial, I mean; Karen’s and Dutton’s and to some extent my own—of Bloodsmoor. Which hit the market at about the drear hour the market began to sink. Will it rise again? Poor Ontario Review Press! Poor “literary magazines”! With libraries closing…bookstores closing or struggling to stay open…. The end-of-1982 isn’t a very cheery time for literary-oriented people but, well, we shall celebrate nonetheless tonight. Simply to step foot in 1983 is a great privilege.)

  * This uncollected story appeared in the fall 1982 issue of Antioch Review.

  * This story, “The Witness,” appeared in the spring–summer 1983 issue of Antaeus and was collected in Last Days.

  * This uncollected story appeared in the winter 1983 issue of Northwest Review.

  * The uncollected story “Sonata Quasi una Fantasia…” appeared in the winter 1985 issue of Fiction; the essay “‘At Least I Have Made a Woman of Her’: Images of Women in Yeats, Lawrence, Faulkner” appeared in the spring 1983 issue of the Georgia Review and was collected in The Profane Art.

  * This uncollected story appeared in the October 1985 issue of Chelsea.

  * Re-titled “Last Days,” this story appeared in the summer 1983 issue of Michigan Quarterly Review and was reprinted in Last Days. Itdealt with Oates’s experiences in her University of Detroit days with a troubled graduate student, ultimately a suicide, named Richard Wishnetsky. Her early story “In the Region of Ice” had also dealt with her relationship with Wishnetsky.

  * This poem appeared in the spring 1983 issue of Southern Review and was reprinted in the volume Luxury of Sin (Lord John Press, 1984).

  * This story appeared in the winter 1983 issue of Massachusetts Review and was collected in Raven’s Wing (Dutton, 1986).

  † This story had appeared in the summer 1965 issue of Kenyon Review and was reprinted in Upon the Sweeping Flood (Vanguard, 1966).

  * This idea would culminate in two volumes of what Oates called “miniature narratives”: The Assignation (Ecco, 1988) and Where Is Here? (Ecco, 1992).

  * This uncollected story appeared in the summer 1982 issue of Shenandoah.

  * The editor and poet Theodore Weiss and his wife, Renee, were
friends of Oates and Smith at this time.

  † The writers Paul and Betty Fussell were also friends of theirs at this time.

  * Eventually, Oates changed the novel’s title to Mysteries of Winterthurn.

  * This is the collection that was later retitled Last Days.

  * James Wolcott’s extremely negative review of A Bloodsmoor Romance, “Stop Me Before I Write Again: Six Hundred More Pages by Joyce Carol Oates,” appeared in the September 1982 issue of Harper’s.

  * Diane Johnson’s review, “Balloons and Abductions,” appeared in the September 5, 1982, issue of the New York Times Book Review.

  * The uncollected story “Improvisation” appeared in the winter 1983 issue of New Letters; “Night. Sleep. Death. The Stars.” appeared in the autumn 1983 issue of Queen’s Quarterly and was collected in Last Days.

  * In fact, Oates decided to keep Crosswicks back for the time being. Mysteries of Winterthurn appeared in 1984.

  * The uncollected story “For I Will Consider My Cat Jeoffry” appeared in the summer 1984 issue of Michigan Quarterly Review.

  * This story appeared in the fall 1983 issue of Ploughshares and was reprinted in Prize Stories 1985: The O. Henry Awards (Doubleday).

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