Acclaimed author Joyce Carol Oates enjoyed her time as a student at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She loved the city, the water, and the student union.

She has written, however, that her years on the Wisconsin campus were in some ways a “lost time” for her. She found the older, male-dominated faculty – and their old-fashioned teaching methods – boring. And her time marked a turning point that could have sidelined her from her later accolades, which include a National Book Award, the National Humanities Medal and several Pulitzer Prize nominations.

In her 2015 memoir, “The Lost Landscape: A Writer’s Coming of Age,” Oates describes her daunting oral exam for her master’s degree, which ultimately prevented her from continuing on to UW-Madison’s English Ph.D. program. But she says if she had been encouraged to pursue her graduate work, she may never have become the successful writer she is today.

“More than once in my life there has been a fortunate failure at just the right time,” she recently told WPR’s Wisconsin Today. “It cut me off from a path I might have taken, but it wouldn’t have been a good one.”

In the decades following her master’s degree in 1961, Oates developed into one of the most prolific and versatile voices in American literature. In Wisconsin Today, she spoke about her time in Madison, her new literary horror book titled Butcher, and her next plans.

The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Rob Ferrett: What was your experience at UW-Madison?

Joyce Carol Oates: I came from Syracuse University, where the professors were younger. They were more focused on new literature and American literature. When I came to Wisconsin, most of the faculty were older. They came from Harvard and taught in a way that is not fashionable today. They just lectured. So when I came to Wisconsin, I was kind of thrown back into an older kind of pedagogy. I remember one professor just sitting there and reading from his own book.

It was very boring. I had a wonderful professor, Helen White. She taught medieval literature and I think she was able to make it more lively. I have very fond memories of Helen White.

RF: There is a library not far from my seat, which is now named after her. Except for Helen White, these professors were mostly older men. Was sexism part of this negative experience?

JCO: I think so. If I had to do it all over again, I would probably handle it better. Maybe I was naive. I came from Syracuse, where I was valedictorian. They were respectful to me and other female students. But then when I got to Wisconsin, it was more of an older patriarchy. I didn’t really know how to deal with that.

It just wasn’t the right place for me. To quote Bob Dylan, “I was glad to get out of there alive.”

RF: Your new novel, “Butcher,” is about a 19th-century doctor who conducts cruel experiments on women in an insane asylum where he is the medical director. Why did you choose this subject?

JCO: The history of medicine is extremely fascinating. It sheds a lot of light on how people view each other today, especially in a patriarchal culture. How doctors and surgeons viewed women and how mental illness in women was often treated with hysterectomies and other surgeries related to human femininity.

RF: Do you think these patriarchal views in medicine continued after the 19th century?

JCO: That is very true. Even Aristotle considered women to be second-class citizens, subhumans compared to men, and if a woman was upset about something – it could be her role in life, she might not want to get married or have children – it was considered hysteria. Men could not be hysterical because hysteria came from the womb. The female sex organs were often removed.

RF: Is there a connection between the committee’s decision not to let you continue with a Ph.D. program and some of the themes in your new book? Perhaps how older men, set in their ways, decide a woman’s future?

JCO: That’s very interesting. I remember it well, but it was a blessing in a way. I had no intention of doing a PhD. If they had said to me, “Oh, Joyce, you’re exactly what we want. You’ll be like Helen White. You have to do a PhD and we’ll give you a fellowship,” it might have ruined my life. I would have been slaving away in the library, doing this historical research and talking about sources. My life would have been sabotaged.

RF: You are now well over 80. What motivates you to continue writing and being creative?

JCO: Actually, it’s the opposite. I don’t have enough time to do all the things I want to do. I have many, many drafts of novels and stories, all kinds of notes. I really have too many ideas.

RF: I know you have a number of projects in mind. Is there one that’s at the forefront that could turn out to be your next novel??

JCO: My next novel is a crime experiment. I’ve never written in this genre before. It’s a crime novel. There’s a person’s dismembered body. We learn who he is and we learn about the community. We go through an investigation with a real detective, a real police investigation. I had a lot of fun writing a crime novel. I love reading crime novels.