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4.0 out of 5 stars
Fragmentary evidence of civilization, September 29, 2003
Henry Robbins was a New York editor. He died in 1979. There was a memorial service for him at the Society of Ethical Culture. He was hurt when his authors got bad reviews. The editor gives the writer the idea of himself.
Joan Didion writes of the expectation the Ronald Reagans had that other people would take care of their needs. A presidential campaign is a set. It is moved at considerable expense from location to location. A campaign can be an isolating experience. Didion is hilarious about ball-playing on the tarmac.
We learn of the generations of Hearsts preceding Patricia Campbell Hearst. The original Wyntoon was a creation of the architect Bernard Maybeck. It burned down. Patty attended school at the Convent of the Sacred Heart in Menlo Park. Patricia Hearst wrote of her experience of being kidnapped. Life with the SLA had the distorted logic of dreams.
Living in Los Angeles requires the driving of great distances. There is an absence of narrative. Didion decides that narrative is sentimental anyway.
Joan Didion describes Vietnamese refugee camps in Hong Kong. The residents of the camps put their lives on hold waiting for the consular interview, hoping to achieve relocation.
In California movies are the industry. It is believed that writers can always be replaced.
Los Angeles was literally invented by the Los Angeles Times and its owners. To oppose the Chandlers was to oppose the perfection of Los Angeles.
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