When I first began
collecting Joyce Carol Oates back in the 70s, I had no idea how difficult a
task it might be. She averages about 5
books a year, but some have slipped past me leaving a hole like a missing
tooth. Her latest work is one that made
move it to the top of my TBR pile. Soul at the White Heat: Inspiration,
Obsession, and the Writing Life encapsulates all the things I love about
her work. The title comes from an Emily
Dickinson poem. Of the thirty-three
essays in this amazing collection, fifteen are by Oates and the remaining
represent many of the writers I most admire: for example, John Updike, Doris
Lessing, J.M. Coetzee, Julian Barnes, Margaret Atwood, Anne Tyler, and Margaret
Drabble to name a few.
The first four essays
are by Oates and deal with “The Writing Life.”
The first asks the question, “Is the Uninspired Life Worth Living?” This has haunted me for decades. When I finish a book, my first order of duty
is searching for my next read. I have
numerous piles from which to choose from, but sometimes, I feel as though I
need to take a break from reading. That
break rarely lasts longer than a few hours, while my mind wanders among the
shelves searching for the next read.
This obsession never dies, although the flames do flicker a bit. Joyce quotes numerous authors as far back as
the ancient Greeks right up to Updike.
Swimming through this essay alone, visiting authors like Virginia Woolf,
George Eliot, and many others too numerous to count, compensates ten-fold for
the purchase of the book. In he next
essay, she provides her “Five Motives for Writing.” It is as if she has hacked my brain and
reminded me of why I love to write.
“Commemoration,” “Bearing Witness,” “Self-Expression,” “Propaganda, or
moralizing,” and “Aesthetic Object,” are all reasons I write, even though I
never planned that out. They seem to me
natural reasons for writing. What could
possibly be a better validation for an aspiring writing from such a
source. She finishes this section with
“Anatomy of a Story,” and “The Writing Room.”
Once again, she has described – with only a few minor alterations, my
writing place.
Joyce writes, “There
is surely some subtle connection between the vistas we face, and the writing we
accomplish, as a dream takes its mood and imagery from our waking life”
(46). She continues, “[My] writing room
replicates to a degree, the old, lost vistas of my childhood. What it contains is less significant to me
than what overlooks though obviously there are precious things here. […]
Like all writers, I have made my writing room a sanctuary of the soul”
(46). Joyce admits, “I love my study and
am unhappy to leave it for long” (47).
Need I say exactly the same thing about my library, my desk, my
teetering piles of novels. This is what
have drawn me to Oates since I first read her back in the 60s.
This review is only “Part
One” of what I have to say about this marvelous, enchanting, thought provoking
guide to the writing life. To me, Oates
is the premier woman of letters alive today.
In “Part Two,” I will talk about some of the other essays she has written,
and “Part Three” will look at some of the reviews Oates has written. Stay tuned—if you have the patience to
wait—or, if you are like me, rush out and add this to your library. Soul at
the White Heat: Inspiration, Obsession, and the Writing Life by Joyce Carol
Oates is a book every writer should own.
I cannot recommend more it more highly.
Part One merits—5 Stars.
--Chiron, 4/2/17
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