News at Eleven: [Sharon Olds] laughs. "Well . . . companionship.

And pleasure: musical pleasure, in hearing it--and, to the inner ear, in reading it on the page. And recognition: 'Someone else has felt what I've felt.' And surprise: 'I never thought of that.' Reading poems can give us information about emotional states, or subjects, give us virtual experience which may be very different from our own. Yes! Maybe this is it! I think that the arts are for showing us ourselves--including what's dangerous about us--holding a mirror up to nature."

from The Guardian: Olds' worlds

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