"Memory blurs, that's the point. If memory didn't blur you wouldn't have the fool's courage to do things again, again, again, that tear you apart."
"When I complete a novel I set it aside, and begin work on short stories, and eventually another long work. When I complete that novel I return to the earlier novel and rewrite much of it. In the meantime the second novel lies in a desk drawer."
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Source: Joyce Carol Oates, Lee Milazzo (1989). “Conversations with Joyce Carol Oates”, p.65, Univ. Press of Mississippi
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