Joan Didion Charms Her Crowd

It was standing-room-only last night, as devoted readers and writers packed the Paula Cooper gallery to hear Joan Didion read from her latest novel, Blue Nights. The book, which hit shelves on Tuesday, tells the story of losing her daughter, Quintana soon after the devastating loss of her husband (the subject of 2005′s Year of Magical Thinking).
Cooper’s husband, Jack Macrae, introduced Didion to the adoring crowd: “Few writers make the words matter more,” he said. “Her arrangement is distinctive.”
It’s also beloved, and when the tiny author walked up to the podium, the room was silent.  Didion wore a long black skirt and fitted black top, with red lipstick and a purple shawl drape artfully over her shoulders and started reading in her low, lolling voice.  “Memory adjusts to what we think we remember…As the blue nights draw to a close (and they can, and they will), you experience an actual chill, an apprehension of illness, at the moment you first notice: the blue light is going, the days are already shortening, the summer is gone,” she read.  “Children are hostages to fortune…What does it mean to let them go?”
When the spell broke, the audience peppered Didion with questions, like what nagged her while writing the book? “Can I finish it? I’m not being facetious. It was a new style I never used before,” she answered honestly.  What was hardest?  “It wasn’t really a narrative at all,” she said, noting that she had to remind herself that books should tell a story.  “It was like a reflection, a dream, more like going to sleep and dreaming.”
A final question, about her writing process, put a grimace on her face: “Rewriting is what I do, rather than write.”