topic Re: JOAN DIDION RIP in Community Chat

JOAN DIDION RIP

Oznell — Thu, 23 Dec 2021 18:11:06 GMT

The now late, great, Joan Didion, has succumbed to complications of Parkinson's disease, at age 87.

One of my favorite contemporary writers, exquisite hot-house prose and sensibility.

Short stories, novels, essays. Love the essays best.

Books: "Play It As It Lays", "The Year of Magical Thinking", "Slouching Toward Bethlehem", on and on.

Lost her husband, John Gregory Dunne (Dominick's brother), and her daughter, Quintana Roo, quite close together, and wrote about both of them movingly.

A gifted, influential writer whose work will last. RIP.

Re: JOAN DIDION RIP

meallen616 — Thu, 23 Dec 2021 18:21:18 GMT

Re: JOAN DIDION RIP

Oznell — Thu, 23 Dec 2021 18:33:28 GMT

One of the myriad things I love about her writings, is how rooted in place she was. She was originally from the dusty, slow-river-moving Central Valley region of California.

She's one of the sharpest observers and chroniclers of California, and she and Victor Davis Hanson made me endlessly curious about the elusive Central Valley.

Joan Didion on her home state:

“California is a place in which a boom mentality and a sense of Chekhovian loss meet in uneasy suspension; in which the mind is troubled by some buried but ineradicable suspicion that things better work here, because here, beneath the immense bleached sky, is where we run out of continent.” J. Didion

Didion in the Sixties, when she burst on the scene with her uniquely wry brilliance:

Re: JOAN DIDION RIP

JamandBread — Thu, 23 Dec 2021 18:38:27 GMT

Joan Didion is one of my favorite authors. I read Slouching Toward Bethlehem and The Year of Magical Thinking years and years ago.

When my best friend lost her husband, I read 'Magical Thinking' again. And this time I really understood.

May she rest in peace with her husband and her daughter.

Re: JOAN DIDION RIP

Somertime — Thu, 23 Dec 2021 18:39:25 GMT

Beautiful documentary by Griffin Dunne on her. You could see at the time how very frail she was.

The Center Will Not Hold is the name and it is on Netflix for anyone who is interested.

Re: JOAN DIDION RIP

PickyPicky3 — Thu, 23 Dec 2021 19:09:41 GMT

Joan Didion is the author who, over my lifetime, I tried the hardest to connect with, but ultimately could not.

One side of my brain would take pleasure at her insight, but the other side screamed for a red editing pen.

She will be missed by readers all over the world.

RIP.

Re: JOAN DIDION RIP

qualitygal — Thu, 23 Dec 2021 20:23:48 GMT

I saw a biography type of show on her once. Know nothing of her, but found it interesting to learn about her.