“Didion was one of the country’s most trenchant writers and astute observers,” the statement said. “Her best-selling works of fiction, commentary and memoir have received numerous honors and are considered modern classics.”
In five novels, six screenplays and more than a dozen nonfiction books, Didion “investigated and interrogated the absurdities of contemporary American life,” according to the National Endowment for the Humanities. While presenting her with the 2012 National Medal of Humanities, President Barack Obama noted that she had “rightly ... earned distinction as one of the most celebrated American writers of her generation.”
“Decades into (her) career, she remains one of our sharpest and most respected observers of American politics and culture,” he said.
Born in Sacramento in 1934, Didion’s father was a member of the Army Air Corps and her family moved around frequently. At her mother’s suggestion, she began writing to entertain herself when she was four or five years old.
She attended the University of California, Berkeley, and won a Vogue magazine contest in 1956 that led to her first essay being published. Her first novel, “Run River,” was published in 1963. Five years later, she published her first essay collection, “Slouching Towards Bethlehem.” Years later, she turned to political reporting.
“She was fearless, original and a marvelous observer,” Robert B. Silvers said in 2009 during an interview with The New York Times. Silvers, who died in 2017, was editor of The New York Review of Books, which began publishing Didion’s work in the 1970s, according to the newspaper.
“She was very skeptical of the conventional view and brilliant at finding the person or situation that was telling about the broader picture,” he said. “She was a great reporter.”
Didion married John Gregory Dunne, then a Time magazine staffer, in 1964, the Los Angeles Times reported. He died suddenly of a heart attack in 2003 after collapsing at their table while their adopted daughter, Quintana Roo Dunne Michael, was hospitalized, prompting her to write the heartbreaking 2005 memoir chronicling the aftermath of her loss, “The Year of Magical Thinking,” according to The Associated Press.
In 2005, Quintana died at the age of 39 of acute pancreatitis, the AP reported. Didion wrote about her daughter’s death in 2011′s “Blue Nights.”
“We have kind of evolved into a society where grieving is totally hidden,” she told the AP in 2005. “It doesn’t take place in our family. It takes place not at all.”
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Photos: Joan Didion through the years NEW YORK, NY - SEPTEMBER 24: Joan Didion attends The American Theatre Wing's 2012 Annual Gala at The Plaza Hotel on September 24, 2012 in New York City. (Photo by Jemal Countess/Getty Images) (Jemal Countess/Getty Images)
Photos: Joan Didion through the years WASHINGTON, DC - JULY 10: U.S. President Barack Obama (R) helps as author Joan Didion (C) is escorted from the stage after being presented a 2012 National Humanities Medal during a ceremony in the East Room of the White House on July 10, 2013 in Washington, DC. Didion is recognized for her mastery of style in writing. (Photo by Pete Marovich/Getty Images) (Pete Marovich/Getty Images)
Photos: Joan Didion through the years Robert Graham, Eric Fischl John Baldessari, Joan Didion, guest and Anjelica Huston (Photo by Alexandra Wyman/WireImage for Hammer Museum) (Alexandra Wyman/WireImage for Hammer Museum)
Photos: Joan Didion through the years David Hare, director, Joan Didion and Vanessa Redgrave (Photo by Jemal Countess/WireImage) (Jemal Countess/WireImage)
Photos: Joan Didion through the years NEW YORK, NY - OCTOBER 11: Director Griffin Dunne and Writer Joan Didion attend the 55th New York Film Festival presentation of - "Joan Didion: The Center Will Not Hold" at Alice Tully Hall on October 11, 2017 in New York City. (Photo by Nicholas Hunt/Getty Images) (Nicholas Hunt/Getty Images)
Photos: Joan Didion through the years Portrait of American author Joan Didion as she sits in a chair in front of a bookshelf, Berkeley, California, April 1981. (Photo by Janet Fries/Getty Images) (Janet Fries/Getty Images)
Photos: Joan Didion through the years American authors Joan Didion and her husband John Gregory Dunne (1932 - 2003) attend a party for the movie 'Play It As It Lays' at the Directors' Guild of America in Los Angeles, October 1972. The film was based on the 1970 novel of the same name by Didion, and she co-wrote the screenplay with Dunne. (Photo by Frank Edwards/Fotos International/Getty Images) (Frank Edwards/Getty Images)
Photos: Joan Didion through the years American author Joan Didion speaks at an unspecified event at the College of Marin, Kentfield, California, February 1977. (Photo by Janet Fries/Getty Images) (Janet Fries/Getty Images)
