Her nonfiction works include Salvador (1983), Miami (1987), After Henry (1992), Political Fictions (2001), Where I Was From (2003), We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live (2006), Blue Nights (2011), South and West (2017) and Let Me Tell You What I Mean (2021). Didion’s other novels include A Book of Common Prayer (1977), Democracy (1984), and The Last Thing He Wanted (1996).ĭidion’s first volume of essays, Slouching Towards Bethlehem, was published in 1968, and her second, The White Album, was published in 1979. Didion published her first novel, Run River, in 1963. After graduation, Didion moved to New York and began working for Vogue, which led to her career as a journalist and writer. JOAN DIDION was born in Sacramento in 1934 and graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, in 1956. Each piece is classic Didion: incisive, bemused, and stunningly prescient. In 'Why I Write,' Didion ponders the act of writing: 'I write entirely to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means.' From her admiration for Hemingway's sentences to her acknowledgment that Martha Stewart's story is one 'that has historically encouraged women in this country, even as it has threatened men,' these essays are acutely and brilliantly observed. Here, Didion touches on topics ranging from newspapers ('the problem is not so much whether one trusts the news as to whether one finds it'), to the fantasy of San Simeon, to not getting into Stanford.

They showcase Joan Didion's incisive reporting, her empathetic gaze, and her role as 'an articulate witness to the most stubborn and intractable truths of our time' ( The New York Times Book Review). With a forward by Hilton Als, these twelve pieces from 1968 to 2000, never before gathered together, offer an illuminating glimpse into the mind and process of a legendary figure. From one of our most iconic and influential writers, the award-winning author of The Year of Magical Thinking: a timeless collection of mostly early pieces that reveal what would become Joan Didion's subjects, including the press, politics, California robber barons, women, and her own self-doubt.A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR

Didion let me tell you what i mean