The Last Love Song

by Tracy Daugherty

  “Humanity learned how to destroy”: Matthys Levy and Mario Salvadori, Why Buildings Fall Down (New York: W. W. Norton, 2002), 239.

  “Everyone’s … talking”: Didion quoted in Tom Christie, “The Secret Agent: Joan Didion Talks,” L.A. Weekly, October 3, 2001; available at laweekly.com/news/the-secret-agent-2133880.

  “had been just too frail”: Joan Didion, Where I Was From (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2003), 204.

  “when she died”: Hari Kunzru, “Joan Didion’s Yellow Corvette,” posted at harikunzryu.com/archive/joan-didions-yellow-corvette-interview-transcript-2011.

  “two pieces of silver flatware”: Didion, Where I Was From, 225–26.

  “lightening of spirit”: ibid., 204.

  “I took one bite”: ibid., 207.

  “call-to-action”: ibid., 205.

  “[W]ho will remember me”: ibid., 204.

  “[I]t’s fine”: ibid., 206.

  “I insisted to my brother”: Kunzru, “Joan Didion’s Yellow Corvette.”

  “Joan Didion and Nancy Kennedy”: Didion, Where I Was From, 224.

  “When my father died”: ibid., 225.

  “I dare you to spit on my flag!”: John M. Hubbell, “A Sharp Eye on Politics: Joan Didion Reflects on New York’s Tragedy, Washington’s Elite,” San Francisco Chronicle, September 25, 2001; available at sfgate.com/entertainment/article/A-sharp-eye-on-politics-Joan-Didion-reflects-on-2874929.php.

  “an infinitely romantic notion”: cited in ibid.

  “The last of the sentence”: ibid.

  “encounter with an America”: Joan Didion, Fixed Ideas, 5.

  “good deal of opportunistic ground”: ibid., 6.

  “[T]he words ‘bipartisanship’”: ibid.

  “Washington was still talking”: ibid., 7.

  “These people got it”: ibid.

  “Bush says the country needs to be reborn” and ensuing dialogue: Christie, “The Secret Agent.”

  “view of our cold war victory”: Thomas Mallon, “On Second Thought,” New York Times, September 25, 2005; available at www.nytimes.com/2003/09/28/books/on-second-thought.html.

  “notion that non-voters are a seething, alienated mass”: Joe Klein, “Bulworthism,” The New Republic, November 15, 2001; available at powells.com/review/2001_11_15.html.

  “Remember Mencken?”: Linda Hall, “The Writer Who Came In from the Cold,” New York, September 2, 1996, 30.

  “My responses are pretty much the same”: Didion quoted in Christie, “The Secret Agent.”

  “I don’t know who is represented”: ibid.

  “political trajectory”: Rachel Donadio, “Every Day Is All There Is,” New York Times, October 9, 2005; available at www.nytimes.com/2005/10/09/books/review/09donadio.html.

  “I think of political writing”: Didion quoted in ibid.

  “[P]eople, if they got it”: Didion, Fixed Ideas, 7.

  “was being processed, obscured, systematically leached”: ibid., 8–9.

  “evildoers,” “moral clarity,” and “America’s New War”: Frank Rich, “Preface” to ibid., ix.

  “[T]his reinvention of Bush as a leader”: Didion quoted in J. Hale Russell, “Joan Didion Takes On the Political Establishment,” The Harvard Crimson, October 19, 2001; available at thecrimson.com/article/2001/10/19/joan-didion-takes-on-the-political/.

  “You know that famous Vietnam thing”: Didion quoted in Christie, “The Secret Agent.”

  “[W]e have been instructed”: Rich, “Preface” to Didion, Fixed Ideas, vii.

  “discussion got short-circuited”: Steven Weber quoted in Didion, Fixed Ideas, 20–21.

  “discussion with nowhere to go”: ibid., 21.

  “I made up my mind”: George W. Bush quoted in ibid., 36.

  “Given all we have said”: ibid.

  “It draws you toward it”: ibid.

  “I think that democracy has shallow roots”: Jonah Raskin, “Joan Didion”; available at Sonoma.edu/users/r/raskin/interview_didion.htm.

  “Stall. Keep the options open”: Didion, Fixed Ideas, 21–22.

  “Jesus Christ”: Joan Didion, The Last Thing He Wanted (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1996), 61.

  CHAPTER 35

  as one critic pointed out: Thomas Larson, “Music, Memory, and Prose: On Joan Didion’s Memoirs,” Puerto del Sol 47, no. 1 (Summer 2012); available at thomaslarson.com/publications/essays-and-memoirs/242-music-memory-prose.html.

  “There is no real way to deal with everything we lose”: Joan Didion, Where I Was From (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2003), 225.

  “All of the great English fiction”: Meghan Daum, “Conversation Between Joan Didion and Meghan Daum,” Black Book, December 12, 2004; available (2011) at meghandaum.com/about-meghan-daum/36-conversation-between-joan-didion-and-meghan-daum.

  “I think specifically novels”: ibid.

  “My great-great-great-great-great-grandmother”: Didion, Where I Was From, 3.

  “California likes to be fooled”: Frank Norris quoted in Andrew O’Hehir, “Golden State of Hypocrisy”; available at salon.com/2003/10/18/didion_4/.

  “willingness to abandon”: ibid.

  “Well, it is hard to know”: ibid.

  “towns I knew”: Didion, Where I Was From, 183.

  “[w]e were seeing nothing ‘new’ here”: ibid.

  “[W]hen the families of inmates”: ibid., 186–87.

  “It was only Quintana who was real”: ibid., 219.

  “saying goodbye” and “It’s a love song”: O’Hehir, “Golden State of Hypocrisy.”

  “about being older”: Adair Lara, “You Can’t Keep the California Out of Joan Didion,” San Francisco Chronicle, January 6, 2004.

  “Be a better person” and “[N]obody can ever be nice enough”: ibid.

  CHAPTER 36

  “My father likes nobody”: Rosemary Breslin, Not Exactly What I Had in Mind (New York: Villard Books, 1997), 64.

  “was dating some anemic offspring” and “children of successful parents”: ibid.

  “the chronicler of the society set” and “who [said] in all his years”: ibid.

  “an extremely rare occurrence”: ibid.

  “someone with a center made of steel” and subsequent quotes by Rosemary Breslin: ibid., 88.

  “I remember being dazzled”: Dominick Dunne quoted in Chris Smith, “Dominick Dunne vs. Robert Kennedy,” New York; available at nymag.com/nymetro/news/crimelaw/features/n_8816.

  “Joe Kennedy be so”: ibid.

  “pathetic creature” and “The formula”: ibid. In 2012 a Connecticut judge overturned Skakel’s murder conviction and recommended he be retried. See Mike Hogan, “Michael Skakel Retrial Order Would Have Infuriated Dominick Dunne,” Vanity Fair, October 24, 2013; available at www.vanityfair.com/online/daily/2013/10/michael-skakel-retrial-dominick-dunne.

  “I don’t give a fuck”: Smith, “Dominick Dunne vs. Robert Kennedy.”

  “friendship” and Nick’s subsequent story: ibid.

  “I’ve had prostate cancer”: ibid.

  “by happenstance” and Nick’s subsequent comments on the brothers’ reconciliation: Dominick Dunne, “A Death in the Family,” originally published in Vanity Fair, March 2004; reprinted in Andrew Blauner, ed., Brothers: 26 Stories of Love and Rivalry (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2009), 192–93.

  “He had these big, arty glasses”: Meghan Daum to the author, March 29, 2013.

  “John was having problems with his heart”: Dominick Dunne, “A Death in the Family,” 193.

  not for eleven million dollars: Fox News, March 14, 2005; available at foxnews.com/story/2005/03/14/condit-settles-lawsuit-against-writer-dunne/.

  “being found”: Joan Didion, Blue Nights (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2011), 128.

  “shattering”: ibid., 129.

  “I phoned her once or twice”: Anna Connolly to the author, March 20, 2013.

  “It was a meeting by proximity” and all subsequent quotes from Sean Day Michael: Sean Day Michael to the author, Novemb
er 2, 2013.

  “vacuum”: Joan Didion, Slouching Towards Bethlehem (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1968), 122–23.

  “no longer pretend”: ibid.

  early career start: For details about Gerry Michael and the Bummers, I have drawn on Weston Blalock and Julia Blalock, remarks posted at rootsofwoodstock.com/2013/03/28/gerry-michael-and-the-bummers. I am grateful to Weston Blalock for his help.

  CHAPTER 37

  “When something happens to me”: Joan Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005), 196.

  reminded Didion of a night alone: ibid., 131.

  “What exactly do those wit-nits”: Joan Didion e-mail to Susanna Moore, April 16, 2005, Susanna Moore Papers, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

  “Not our friend from the bridge”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 38.

  “[Didion’s] place in American letters”: Linda Hall, “The Writer Who Came In from the Cold,” New York, September 2, 1996, 30.

  “quick sunlight dappling” and “apprehension of death”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 76.

  “[O]n the contrary”: ibid., 77.

  “Let’s do it”: Joan Didion, Blue Nights (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2011), 5.

  “I remember how unhappy John was that day”: Josh Greenfeld in conversation with the author, April 6, 2013.

  “Wasn’t that just about perfect”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 71.

  “That settles it then”: ibid., 80.

  Episcopalians “took” Communion: ibid., 81.

  “Joan Didion,” “hack,” and “bitch”: John Gregory Dunne e-mail to Susanna Moore, December 7, 2003, Susanna Moore Papers, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

  “You were right about Hawaii”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 82.

  “fritter[ed] away”: ibid., 186.

  “You can use it if you want to”: ibid., 23.

  “Goddamn. Don’t ever tell me again you can’t write”: ibid., 166.

  Didion said she envied her friend: Joan Didion e-mail to Susanna Moore, December 24, 2003, Susanna Moore Papers, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

  CHAPTER 38

  “fell into a kind of semi-conscious state”: Amy Ephron, “Kind of Blue,” Los Angeles Review of Books, October 27, 2011; available at tumblr.lareviewofbooks.org/post/11988483028/kind-of-blue.

  “How does ‘flu’ morph into whole-body infection”: Joan Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005), 67.

  “There really was no explanation given”: Didion quoted in Adam Higginbotham, “Joan Didion: A Mother’s Journey Into Grief,” Belfast Telegraph, November 14, 2011; available at belfasttelegraph.co.uk/woman/life/joan-didion-a-mothers-journey-into-grief-28680460.html.

  “walking pneumonia” and “nothing serious”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 64.

  “feeling terrible”: ibid., 63.

  “I was in town”: Sean Day Michael to the author, November 2, 2013.

  “Do I think her lifestyle contributed to her death?”: Sean Day Michael to the author, November 4, 2013.

  “She’s still beautiful”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 218.

  “More than one more day”: ibid., 68.

  “sobbed about his daughter”: Dominick Dunne, “A Death in the Family,” originally published in Vanity Fair, March 2004; reprinted in Andrew Blauner, ed., Brothers: 26 Stories of Love and Rivalry (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2009), 184.

  “which way this is going”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 62.

  “Why did I waste time”: ibid., 82.

  “I don’t think I’m up for this” and “You don’t get a choice”: ibid., 217.

  “Don’t do that”: ibid., 10.

  Quintana’s dreams about the Broken Man: ibid., 219.

  “The minute I got to him”: Didion quoted in Dominick Dunne, “A Death in the Family,” 184–85.

  Didion took a taxi home: For details of the night of Dunne’s death, see Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 3–23.

  “leaden”: ibid., 31.

  The obituary in The New York Times: Richard Severo, “John Gregory Dunne, Novelist, Screenwriter, and Observer of Hollywood Is Dead at 71,” New York Times, January 1, 2004; available at www.nytimes.com/2004/01/01/arts/john-gregory-dunne-novelist-screenwriter-and-observer-of-hollywood-is-dead-at-71.html.

  “I knew he had heart trouble”: Hari Kunzru, “Joan Didion’s Yellow Corvette,” posted at harikunzru.com/archive/joan-didions-yellow-corvette-interview-transcript-2011.

  “I couldn’t help drawing a line”: Sean Day Michael to the author, November 2, 2013.

  “Then when is she coming in?”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 84.

  “Where’s Dad?”: ibid.

  “How’s Dad?”: ibid.

  “But how is he now?”: ibid.

  CHAPTER 39

  “sunny room” and “[c]old milk”: Emily Post quoted in Joan Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2005), 58.

  “Don’t tell me your dream”: ibid., 159.

  “a very new-on-the-scene blood thinner”: Sean Day Michael to the author, November 2, 2013.

  “For nothing now can ever come to any good”: W. H. Auden’s “Funeral Blues” cited in Joan Didion, Blue Nights (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2011), 156–57.

  “wrong” and “vehement”: ibid., 157.

  “place to be”: Liz Smith cited in an e-mail from Joan Didion to Susanna Moore, March 5, 2004, Susanna Moore Papers, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

  “When John was alive”: Hari Kunzru, “Joan Didion’s Yellow Corvette,” posted at harikunzru.com/archive/joan-didion-yellow-corvette-interview-transcript-2011.

  Dunne’s memorial: all quotes regarding the memorial service are from Jane Gross, “John Gregory Dunne Eulogized in Cathedral,” New York Times, March 24, 2004; available at www.nytimes.com/2004/03/04/nyregion/john-gregory-dunne-eulogized-in-cathedral.html.

  “I had encouraged this”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 86.

  “[My dad] said she was fine walking one minute”: Sean Day Michael to the author, November 4, 2013.

  “reliable” folks: Claire Potter, “Slouching Towards Joan Didion,” posted at chronicle.com/blognetwork/tenuredradical/2012/01/slouching-towards-joan-didion/.

  “Do I know if she was drinking”: Sean Day Michael to the author, November 4, 2013.

  “happened to be in New York”: Sean Day Michael to the author, November 2, 2013.

  “You’re safe”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 96.

  “When do you have to leave?”: ibid.

  For the next five weeks: For details of this period and “the vortex effect,” see ibid., 107–118.

  “suspicious violation of boundaries”: ibid., 106.

  “suggesting trauma all over Southern California”: ibid., 135–36.

  “cornfield”: ibid., 138.

  “Am I going to make it?” and “Definitely”: ibid., 140.

  “It was a Quarter Pounder”: ibid.

  “systematic … sadistic,” “[b]reaking chemical lights,” and “almost went into cardiac arrest”: Seymour Hersh, “Torture at Abu Ghraib,” The New Yorker, May 10, 2004, 43.

  “senior military officers”: ibid., 46.

  “enhanced interrogation techniques”: ibid., 47.

  “collective wrong-doing”: ibid.

  “Army intelligence officers”: ibid., 45.

  “Do you really think”: ibid., 44.

  “tell you what you want to hear”: ibid., 47.

  Cheney said simply: See Chris McGreal, “Dick Cheney Defends Use of Torture on al-Qaida Leaders,” The Guardian, September 9, 2011; available at www.theguardian.com/world/2011/sep/09/dick-cheney-defends-torture-al-qaida.

  A caller to Rush Limbaugh’s radio talk
show: See “Rush: MPs Just ‘Blowing Off Steam,’” CBS News, May 6, 2004; available at www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/05/06/opinion/meyer/main616021.shtml.

  “The photographs are us”: Susan Sontag, “Regarding the Torture of Others,” New York Times, May 23, 2004; available at www.nytimes.com/2004/05/23/magazine/regarding-the-torture-of-others.html.

  “image of a frightened, naked man”: Elaine Scarry quoted in Linda Myers, “Torture Can Never Be Defended as a Military Necessity, Asserts Harvard Professor and Iraq War Critic Elaine Scarry,” Cornell Chronicle, March 6, 2014; available at news.cornell.edu/stories/2006/05/torture-can-never-be-defended-military-necessity-says-harvard-prof.

  Gerry Michael’s insurance stopped paying: Didion expressed these concerns to Susanna Moore in e-mails in April 2005, Susanna Moore Papers, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

  “shadowy silhouettes”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 178.

  “attempt to make sense”: ibid., 7.

  “Life changes in the instant”: ibid., 3.

  “Primitive men and neurotics”: Freud’s Totem and Taboo cited in Jeffrey Berman, Companionship in Grief: Love and Loss in the Memoirs of C. S. Lewis, John Bayley, Donald Hall, Joan Didion, and Calvin Trillin (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2010), 205.

  “pathological condition”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 34–35.

  “Let them become the photograph on the table”: ibid., 226.

  “as January becomes February”: Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking, 225.

  she had an image: Joan Didion e-mail to Susanna Moore, December 2, 2004, Susanna Moore Papers, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

  CHAPTER 40

  “[V]ery good. Really interesting”: Joan Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking: A Play (New York: Vintage, 2007), 53.

  Didion started to venture out in public: Details about Didion’s activities are from correspondence between Didion and Susanna Moore in the early months of 2005, Susanna Moore Papers, Department of Rare Books and Special Collections, Princeton University Library.

  “anybody” was at “home” and “No one who has had even a passing exposure”: Joan Didion, “The Case of Theresa Schiavo,” The New York Review of Books, June 9, 2005; available at nybooks.com/articles/archives/2005/jun/09/the-case-of-theresa-schiavo.