Sunday, March 24, 2013

Oates and Twitter: Literary Affirmation?

I enjoy reading the definitions and explanations people provide when they talk about Twitter.

I usually say that Twitter is an idea stream or "your questions answered."

Today in the Boston Globe's Bibliophile there's an interview with the author Joyce Carol Oates.  I really like the way she describes Twitter:

"Books: What else do you read?"

"Oates: I follow 30 people on Twitter, which makes for a kind of online magazine.  Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times posts about 15 times a day.  He'll have links to photographs and other sites. I also follow Daniel Mendelsohn, Andrew Sullivan, Margaret Atwood, and Steve Martin.  In a way it's like going into a vast library where someone taps you on the shoulder and says, "You might like this article, which you'd never know about otherwise.  I was reading a lot of articles in England's New Statesman. I would never seen them without Twitter. I'm interested in poetry, and some links will take me to poetry sites."

To me, Oates words give Twitter a literary affirmation.  Would you agree?