Joan Didion, an American writer, born in 1934 in Sacramento, California, launched her career in the 1960s after winning an essay contest sponsored by Vogue magazine. After establishing a distinct voice in American fiction, she turned to political reporting and screenwriting.
Career
Didion was a shy, bookish child, but she overcame her shyness through acting and public speaking. She won an essay contest sponsored by Vogue magazine during her final year at UC Berkeley. During his time at Vogue, Didion progressed from research assistant to contributing writer. She also published articles in other magazines and wrote her first novel, ‘Run River (1963)’. Although the novel sold poorly, it received favorable reviews, and she was offered a contract to write a second book. The California of the 1960s provided Didion ample opportunities to write in the personal mode that became known as the New Journalism, also associated with the writers’ Norman Mailer, Tom Wolfe, Hunter Thompson, and Gay Talese. Didion’s essays on the ’60s counterculture were collected in the volume Slouching Towards Bethlehem (1968). One of the signatures works of the decade, the book was published to critical acclaim. Didion’s second novel, ‘Play It as It Lays (1970)’, populated by aimless souls at the edge of the film industry, captures the mood of anomie and alienation engulfing Hollywood at the close of the decade. Didion and her husband, Dunne, wrote the screenplay for the film Panic in Needle Park (1971)’ together for the first time. As a result of their work on the film, the pair became one of Hollywood’s most sought-after screenwriting teams, working as a lucrative sideline to their journalism and fiction careers. They also wrote screenplays for the film adaptation of ‘Play It as It Lays (1972)’; the 1976 remake of A Star Is Born, starring Barbra Streisand and Kris Kristofferson; the film adaptation of Dunne’s novel True ‘Confessions (1981)’; and ‘Up Close and Personal (1996)’, starring Robert Redford.
In 1979, Didion published a second collection of essays, ‘The White Album’. Her voice was admired for its precision and elegance. As a keen social observer, she established a national reputation for her style and precision. Didion’s interest turned to the state of her country’s relations with its southern neighbors in the 1980s, and she examined this topic in two essays, ‘Salvador (1983)’ and ‘Miami (1987)’. ‘A Book of Common Prayer (1977)’, ‘Democracy (1984)’, and ‘The Last Thing He Wanted (1996)’ was also inspired by his travels in Central America and the Pacific. Several of Didion’s city observations appear in her 1992 essay collection ‘After Henry’. In 2001, Didion collected her essays about American politics and government into a political fiction volume. During the writing of ‘Where I Was From (2003)’, she looked back on the history and present of California.
Personal Life
Didion married Time magazine writer John Gregory Dunne in 1964. They intended to stay in Los Angeles for six months, but they ended up staying for 20 years. The couple adopted a baby girl they named Quintana Roo, after the state on the eastern coast of Mexico. Didion’s daughter, Quintana, fell gravely ill in late 2003. Her husband, John Gregory Dunne, died of a heart attack shortly after visiting their comatose child in the hospital. In her book ‘The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion describes her journey through grief with searing honesty. Quintana appeared to be recovering from illness when she finished the book, but she had passed away by the time it was published. In 2005, ‘The Year of Magical Thinking won the National Book Award for Nonfiction.
Here are some beautiful photos of young Joan Didion from her life.
