Joan Didion was a working writer, notes David Ulin, editor of her Library of America editions. She achieved greatness by struggling from job to job.
, which won a National Book Award and — for better and for worse — changed our perception of Didion from reporter to memoirist. The book was written first and foremost as a gesture of survival, a transcription of the bitter experience of grief.“It was a huge part of that year,” she told me. “I’m not sure I could have gotten through it if I hadn’t done something so odd.” And yet, even here, part of the process involved going public.
As for why she contributed to such a middle-brow publication, Didion once explained that the Post paid well and gave her space. What more could a writer need? There, she began to develop the longer essays that would come to define her.
For Didion, this played out more than once over the course of her writing life. In 1970, a project about Linda Kasabian, the Charles Manson acolyte who turned state’s evidence, failed to come together; fragments would emerge in “The White Album.” Five years later, an assignment to report on the Patty Hearst trial for Rolling Stone was left uncompleted, yielding only the 1983 essay “Girl of the Golden West” and some loose notes that were eventually published in “South and West.
Canada Latest News, Canada Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Joan Didion Has Died at 87According to an email from her publisher to the 'Times,' the beloved journalism icon and chronicler of Californian life died of Parkinson’s disease. She was 87
Read more »
Joan Didion Has Died at 87According to an email from her publisher to the 'Times,' the beloved journalism icon and chronicler of Californian life died of Parkinson’s disease. She was 87
Read more »
Open Channel: What Pop Culture Surprised You This Year?Tell us about the things you didn't expect to bring you joy during 2021.
Read more »
Is Gatorade actually better than water?Few of us understand why we might be consuming sports drinks in the first place.
Read more »