A little off-topic for HOB but she’s such an important writer about the American and especially the Californian experience of the 20th century and we’d suggest the Californian experience of centuries yet to come.
As a late teens reader of all those self-important mid 20th-century men (we all know who they are) the breath of fresh air i felt when first reading Slouching Toward Bethlehem and then subsequent books, which I hasten to add, were not easy to find in early 80’s Britain.
Having just spent the last year watching a partner undergoing chemotherapy just having a copy of Magical Thinking to revisit has been, to term a phrase, a godsend.
I have been very happy to see, over the past few years, Didion titles re-printed and available in bookshops the world over. To know that her work rings true with new readers makes me very happy.
Finally, if you haven’t read Salvador, her experience visiting the country in the mid 70’s at the height of the civil war please do read it.
If a few more did they might understand a little more why people are prepared to risk everything for a better life north of the border.
Here’s the Guardian obit.. a much better read than mine.
