The White Album
by Joan Didion · first published 1979
3mentions
3recommended by
3HN commenters
2018–2026first – last mentioned
100% recommend
"The White Album is a mosaic of a time, a mosaic that includes, among other bizarre artifacts and personalities, the dark journeys and impulses of the Manson Family and the Ferguson brothers, the story of Bishop James Pike, and of John Paul Getty's museum, the biker cult, the saga of the California governor's mansions, the romance of water in an arid landscape, the swirl and confusion of th Sixties (the women's movement, the Panthers, Berkeley), and the experience of getting away--to Bogotá, to Las Vegas, the Islands, the road or simply to bed--and coming home again"--Cover.
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One worthwhile vantage point from which to understand the foul and self-serving element of the 1960s in California is Joan Didion’s essay collection The White Album, published 1979. And in particular the title essay, which deals partly with the Manson cult. It is a fascinating book, and she is such a singular writer, with a different and unique viewpoint of the…
on “Surviving Jonestown” ↗…Native Son": https://www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and-videos/podcasts/history-o... Susan Sontag, "Against Interpretation": https://www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and-videos/podcasts/history-o... Joan Didion, "The White Album": https://www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and-videos/podcasts/history-o... David Foster Wallace, "Up, Simba!": https://www.lrb.co.uk/podcasts-and-videos/podcasts/history-o... Umberto Eco, "Thoughts on Wikileaks":…
on “The Best Essay” ↗The White Album is awesome. Other Didion on California is kind of conservative and dismissive of the changes in culture among young people.
on “Slouching Towards Bethlehem – Joan Didion (1967)” ↗