Joyce Carol Oates Offers Writing Advice From Her Younger Self

By Maryann Yin 

Joyce Carol OatesJoyce Carol Oates, a famed author, sat for an interview with BuzzFeed to offer writing advice. Currently, she tends to self-edit as she is working on writing the first draft.

Oates does not recommend using this method. She describes it as “a slow process, almost like putting a mosaic together or weaving things in and out, whereas before it felt more like galloping on a horse and then creating the manuscript.”

Oates, who has served as a creative writing professor at Princeton University, makes it a point to tell her students to “do the whole thing quickly and then revise.” In fact, that was the procedure she followed when she was a young writer. She feels that her “younger self could actually help me now; I need some tips from my younger self.”