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Vintage Didion

joan didion

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Vintage Readers are a perfect introduction to some of the greatest modern writers presented in attractive, accessible paperback editions.

“Didion has the instincts of an exceptional reporter and the focus of a historian . . . a novelist’s appreciation of the surreal.” — Los Angeles Times Book Review

Whether she’s writing about civil war in Central America, political scurrility in Washington, or the tightl -braided myths and realities of her native California, Joan Didion expresses an unblinking vision of the truth.

Vintage Didion includes three chapters from Miami; an excerpt from Salvador ; and three separate essays from After Henry that cover topics from Ronald Reagan to the Central Park jogger case . Also included is “Clinton Agonistes” from Political Fictions , and “Fixed Opinions, or the Hinge of History,” a scathing analysis of the ongoing war on terror.

200 pages, Paperback

First published January 6,2004

This edition

Format
200 pages, Paperback
Published
January 6, 2004 by Vintage
ISBN
9781400033935
ASIN
1400033934
Language
English

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About the author

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joan didion

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Joan Didion was an American writer and journalist. She is considered one of the pioneers of New Journalism along with Gay Talese, Hunter S. Thompson, and Tom Wolfe.
Didion's career began in the 1950s after she won an essay contest sponsored by Vogue magazine. Over the course of her career, Didion wrote essays for many magazines, including The Saturday Evening Post, Life, Esquire, The New York Review of Books and The New Yorker. Her writing during the 1960s through the late 1970s engaged audiences in the realities of the counterculture of the 1960s, the Hollywood lifestyle, and the history and culture of California. Didion's political writing in the 1980s and 1990s often concentrated on the subtext of political rhetoric and the United States's foreign policy in Latin America. In 1991, she wrote the earliest mainstream media article to suggest the Central Park Five had been wrongfully convicted. In 2005, Didion won the National Book Award for Nonfiction and was a finalist for both the National Book Critics Circle Award and the Pulitzer Prize for The Year of Magical Thinking, a memoir of the year following the death of her husband, writer John Gregory Dunne. She later adapted the book into a play that premiered on Broadway in 2007. In 2013, she was awarded the National Humanities Medal by president Barack Obama. Didion was profiled in the Netflix documentary The Center Will Not Hold, directed by her nephew Griffin Dunne, in 2017.

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Community Reviews

Rating(4.1 / 5.0, 35 votes)
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35 reviews All reviews
Profile Image for Kimberly .
awsomegamer420
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
March 26,2025
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This was a treat that delved into a lot of American history. Even the El Salvador essay speaks to certain qualities of being an American in the world. They're all to the point and explore things that weren't quite part of the original narrative. From the Central Park Five, to the Clinton scandal and even the aftermath of 9/11, the essays look at the context and impact. They take a dive into the points around that weren't popular to consider. I think this is one of the gifts of much of Didion's writing, exploring what it means to be part of something, an event or a group. What is created as a result of your participation. This is something that is always worth thinking about as an American, as a human.
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LordTrecaril
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
March 26,2025
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lots of good stories bundled together..a good introduction or overview to her work..
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Kil-Kun
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
March 26,2025
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I lost the book a few days ago with 8(!) pages left, and have been unable to find a new copy. I think it might be time to move on
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Bonzana
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
March 26,2025
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borrowed from kian.
i read it on the plane and on the beach.
the briskness of the writing made it ideal for vacation reading.
it also made me realize how uniformed i am of news events from my earlier life.
even the clinton administration was largely a mystery to me.
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PPWiener
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
March 26,2025
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I've always liked Didion's writing, and this little reader was a great reintroduction to it. As usual I was a little over my head with some of her political writing, but found it fascinating nonetheless. Highly recommended to anyone interested in the history of 20th century America and its politics. There is also a sharp and brilliant essay from 2002 at the end of the book, about the war on terror, which I think is still relevant now, 15 years later. Full blog post here: https://theselittlewords.com/2017/10/...
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