Joan Didion, Literary Titan, Dies at 87
BY EMILY KIRKPATRICK
Joan Didion, a resounding voice in American literature who insightfully captured the ’60s and California through observant and beautiful language, died on Thursday at home in Manhattan. She was 87 years old.
The famed writer’s cause of death was Parkinson’s disease, according to an email sent by her publisher, Paul Bogaards, an executive at Knopf, to The New York Times. Her friend, the writer Hilton Als, also confirmed the news on Instagram. He posted a black square with the simple caption: “Joan Didion. 12.5.34–12.23.21.”
Didion became renowned for her linguistic froideur, keen insights, and provocative yet elegant prose, writing fiction, nonfiction, and screenplays over the course of her lengthy career. But she saved her most personal subjects for last. Her acclaimed 2005 book, The Year of Magical Thinking, in which she grappled with the unexpected death of her husband, won the National Book Award for Nonfiction. She also attempted to come to terms with the death of her child in 2011’s Blue Nights.