“To write a novel is to embark on a quest that is very romantic. People have visions, and the next step is to execute them. That's a very romantic project. Like Edvard Munch's strange dreamlike canvases where people are stylized, like 'The Scream.' Munch must have had that vision in a dream, he never saw it.”

American writer

Joyce Carol Oates is an American writer. Since her first book appeared in 1963, she has published 58 novels, along with plays, novellas, short stories, poetry, and nonfiction. Her work has received wide recognition. Her novel Them won the National Book Award in 1969, and Black Water, What I Lived For, Blonde, and the short story collection Lovely, Dark, Deep: Stories were all finalists for the Pulitzer Prize. She has also received two O. Henry Awards, the National Humanities Medal, and the Jerusalem Prize in 2019.