Jezebel: Joan Didion

Did Alcoholism Kill Joan Didion's Daughter?

Jenna Sauers — Tue, 13 Dec 2011 18:00:00 EST

Readers of Didion's recent memoir of grieving her daughter, Blue Nights, may be forgiven for remaining somewhat unclear, even upon finishing the book, as to what exactly killed Quintana Roo Dunne Michaels. Quintana, whom Didion often calls Q, was in 2005 a recently married New York-based photo editor in apparent good health. She fell into an extended illness and died at the age of 39. More »

Didion's New Blue Nights Is Elegiac But Unsatisfying

Jenna Sauers — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 12:40:00 EDT

Blue Nights Is Elegiac But Unsatisfying" alt="Click here to read Didion's New Blue Nights Is Elegiac But Unsatisfying" src="http://cache.jezebel.com/assets/images/39/2011/11/small_didion_110211.jpg"/>

There are some writers who enter our consciousness at just the right time and remain firmly lodged for life, affecting, like a penny in a drinking fountain, the taste of everything that comes after. I am speaking primarily of the books one reads between about the ages of 17 and 20. Whether classics or assigned texts or whatever now vaguely embarrassing tome happened to be trendy the summer you learned to drive, for better or for worse, they tend to be formative. Everyone, I like to believe, has those books. More »

When Did Elegant Women Become Villains?

Jennifer Wright — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 15:55:00 EST

The show Fairly Legal opens with the heroine, Kate, stumbling out of her houseboat and dodging repeated calls from someone labeled "The Wicked Witch of the West." More »

Michelle Williams & Ryan Gosling Are Not A Couple

Dodai Stewart — Thu, 23 Dec 2010 09:00:00 EST

Michelle Williams and Ryan Gosling are not dating.

Lindsay Banned From Borrowing Clothes; Marc's Ex Writing Tell-All

Jenna Sauers — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 11:30:00 EDT

Lindsay Lohan is apparently no longer welcome publicity for designers. The ankle-braceleted starlet has been — horrors! — banned from borrowing clothing by most fashion houses, according to one tipster. Lohan has been clothing herself by buying things. [E!]

Writer Suggests Jealousy Explains All In Story Of Desirée & Michelle

Jenna Sauers — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 15:20:00 EST

There are some questions that are transparently absurd even in the asking. Should you ever give up a rent-controlled apartment? is one such question. "Was Michelle Obama Jealous of Desirée Rogers?" is another. More »

Style Tips From Tippi Hedren's Model Life

Jenna Sauers — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 14:00:00 EST

The magazine may date from 1953, but the advice (via Modern Mechanix) is timeless. Let's learn from our farmer/model godmother, Tippi, as she juggles the responsibilities of running "from one New York studio appointment to the next" while also...raising horses. More »

Saint Joan: Young Women And The Cult Of Didion

Sadie Stein — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 16:20:00 EST

A couple of years ago, my then-boyfriend wrote a piece of erotica about Joan Didion, which fact should go some ways towards explaining both why the relationship lasted as long as it did, and why we were ultimately incompatible: More »

Slouching Towards Bethlehem

Anna Holmes — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 09:10:00 EDT

[New York, October 26. Image via Getty]

More Arrests In Lindsay Burglary; Cross Snorted Coke In Front Of Obama

Dodai Stewart — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 09:00:00 EDT

The LAPD has arrested four women in connection with break-ins at Lindsay Lohan and Audrina Patridge's homes.

Kanye West Headed To Court

Dodai Stewart — Thu, 19 Mar 2009 09:00:00 EDT

Kanye West has been charged with battery, theft and vandalism stemming from that incident last September in which he smashed a paparazzi's camera at LAX. He's planning a fly courtroom outfit right now. [TMZ, Mirror, Gatecrasher]

Woman Waives Anonymity To Say, "I Was Raped By My Father."

Sadie Stein — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 14:30:00 EST

Candice Dinsdale, now 44, was just six when she was first sexually abused by her father Anthony Allen. Now she's gone public. But should that be so unusual? More »

This Week We Discovered Shoving Garlic Up Our Hoohas Was Srsly "Uncool"

Jessica G. — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 18:00:00 EST

Picture it: the Jezebel nursing home, the year 2068. We'll turn on our headchips to watch the disembodied skull of Oprah host her show, and Jennifer Aniston, having been cryogenically frozen, will have been unfrozen just to make an appearance. Oprah will still ask Jen how she feels about Angelina Jolie and Jen will still think that what Angelina did was "very uncool." We may die, but this story will live on forever.
We found out the hard way that putting garlic up your nono is a no no.
Did we earn our yeast infections the same way Bikini Cory earned her nickname?
Joan Didion: officially more depressing than the mere existence of Bikini Cory.
Not depressing at all: this almost unbearably cute precocious French toddler. We just want to hear lil' Amelie say "crocodeeel" all day long.
Maybe she should have a cute-off with Maru, the box loving kitty from Japan.

Joan Didion Is Kind Of A Downer About The Election

Sadie Stein — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 17:20:00 EST

Last night, I went to see an event at the NYPL to celebrate the New York Review of Books' 45th birthday. It was a panel discussion titled "What Happens Next?" and featuring a distinguished group of six panelists that included scholar Andrew Delbanco, writer Darryl Pinckney, and Joan Didion, the only woman on stage. The idea was for everybody to comment on the election and then speculate about what will happen in the future. Yeah, everyone was smart, many of them widely-admired writers and thinkers, and it was certainly interesting. But thank goodness for Joan. More »

The NY Observer caught up with Joan Didion...

Jessica G. — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 10:20:00 EST

The NY Observer caught up with Joan Didion and asked her what she thinks of our new President. Didion, who was raised a "conservative California Republican" but became a registered Democrat, this to say: "I haven't figured it out. I have to sit down and write about it and try to figure it out…I mean, I think we all we all have high hopes, but who knows?" [Observer] More »

Joan Didion, arguably the best essayist...

Jessica G. — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 10:40:00 EDT

Joan Didion, arguably the best essayist of the late 20th century, has a short piece on Salon about the current election. She believe that all of the campaign noise — candidate's personal "stories," the "lipstick on a pig" repetition, the regurgitated talking points — has distracted us from the serious peril the country is facing. "We could forget that we ourselves induced the coma, by indulging the government in its fantasy of absolute power, wielded absolutely. So general is this fantasy by now that we approach this election with no clear idea where bottom is: what damage has been done, what alliances have been formed and broken, what concealed reefs lie ahead. Whoever we elect president is about to find some of that out," says Didion. Her next book, a collection of nonfiction called We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live, is out next month. [Salon] More »

Esquire Editors Not-So-Fondly Remember A Few Females Who Once Wrote For Them

Jessica G. — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 14:00:00 EDT

Esquire Editors Not-So-Fondly Remember A Few Females Who Once Wrote For Them" alt="Click here to read Esquire Editors Not-So-Fondly Remember A Few Females Who Once Wrote For Them" src="http://cache.jezebel.com/assets/images/39/2008/10/gellhorn101608.jpg"/>

So the other day Esquire published its list of the 75 books every man should read. We noted that there was only one woman on the list, Flannery O'Connor, and this was their commentary on her book of short stories, A Good Man Is Hard To Find, starting with an excerpt of hers: "She would of been a good woman... if it had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life.' Wouldn't we all." Now it appears that Esquire is trying to throw the lady writers a bone by highlighting seven women who have written features in the 75-year history of the magazine. More »

75 Books Every Woman Should Read

Jessica G. — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 16:40:00 EDT

Esquire put up a slideshow of 75 books every man should read, and it is indeed a very good list. However, it's a very good list that's also extremely myopic. It relies way too heavily on the old white dude cannon (particularly the WASP angst end of it) with books by Updike, Cheever, Kingsley and Martin Amis, Hemingway, McPhee, Joyce, Roth, Mailer, and the token Russians. There are only four non-white men on the list (Ellison, Rushdie, Haley, Wright) and just one woman, the incomparable Flannery O'Connor with her classic book of short stories, A Good Man is Hard to Find. The only really offensive choice on the list is Bukowski. I've read Bukowski, and even though he's an old cuss, I like his writing. However, I would never call something so unapologetically misogynistic something men "should" read. Anyway, in light of Esquire's myopia, we decided to curate a list of 20 books every woman should read. You should fill in the other 55 in the comments! More »

More And More Judges Banning The Word "Rape" At Sexual Assault Trials

Jessica G. — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 09:30:00 EDT

Tory Bowen, now 21, was roofied as a Nebraska college student, and when she awoke, according to the Kansas City Star, she was being raped. Sounds pretty straightforward, but a judge in Lincoln prohibited Bowen from using the word "rape" during her testimony. The term "sexual assault" was also verboten. The judge presiding over Bowen's case claims that her use of the term "rape" would sway an impartial jury and mar an otherwise fair trial — the implication being that the word rape is so charged, it would automatically prejudice a jury against the defendant if used. Unfortunately, Bowen is not the only rape victim who has been muzzled. The Star reports that "Senior Judge Gene Martin recently issued a similar order for the trial of a Kansas City man charged with raping a teenager in 2000," and barring the word "rape" from courtrooms is a growing trend around the country. More »

Joan Didion: The Female Writer For Men Who Don't Want To Feel Like Pussies

Jessica — Thu, 27 Dec 2007 17:00:00 EST

Most psuedo-intellectual college age girls who fancy themselves writers will, at some point, worship at the altar of Didion (or maybe that was just me and all my poseur friends!). [No, it wasn't just you. -Ed.] Anyway, in today's Washington Post, resident book critic Jonathan Yardley discusses his "on-and-off love affair" with the inscrutable Ms. Didion as part of a recurring column (similar to our own Fine Lines), wherein he "reconsiders notable books from the past." Yardley goes over what is perhaps Didion's most famous work, Slouching Towards Bethlehem, which he describes as "smart, witty, iconoclastic and deeply informed." All those adjectives are certainly appropriate, but to me, the real marker of Didion's writing is what Yardley calls her "cool"-ness, but what I would call her glacial emotional distance. More »