Authors:
  • Most people think that a widow is inhabiting some elegiac world of - it's like Mozart's 'Requiem Mass.' You know, it's very beautiful and elevated thoughts and some measure of dignity. I didn't have that experience at all. I had one pratfall after another.

    "Author Joyce Carol Oates on Widowhood’s ‘World of Absurdity’". Interview with Jeffrey Brown, www.pbs.org. February 3, 2011.