Acclaimed writer Joan Didion’s demise at the age of 87 leaves behind a gaping hole in the literary world, but there is also a transcendental body of work that no one is about to forget. After Didion’s death yesterday, social media platforms were flooded with tributes and as is perhaps only possible for great artists, her own words became the best way to pay tribute to her. Fans turned to her poignant words about grief and grieving for solace. “Goodbye, Joan Didion. You wrote the most transcendent final page that has ever existed in any book. Thank you for your life and work," a Twitter user and author wrote, sharing a page from her work. Many remembered one of her most popular lines: “We tell stories in order to live". Didion, above all, was a great advocate for life as it comes, complete with its mess and its brilliance. A Twitter user shared: ‘In 1987, Joan Didion offered some advice to new graduates in TIME Magazine: “Live in the mess. Throw yourself out into the convulsions of the world."‘
Perhaps the most apt Joan Didion quote that everyone was seen harking back to was, “A single person is missing for you, and the whole world is empty."
Goodbye, Joan Didion. You wrote the most transcendent final page that has ever existed in any book. Thank you for your life and work. pic.twitter.com/kL4y0O26fW— Jeff Zentner (@jeffzentner) December 23, 2021
In 1987, Joan Didion offered some advice to new graduates in TIME Magazine: "Live in the mess. Throw yourself out into the convulsions of the world." pic.twitter.com/gV6G1A5Iif— Andrew Chow (@andrewrchow) December 23, 2021
"I still believed in possibilities then, still had the sense, so peculiar to New York, that something extraordinary would happen any minute, any day, any month.”― Joan Didion, Slouching Towards Bethlehem
— James Roday Rodriguez (@JamesRoday) December 24, 2021
« I write entirely to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear. »— Joan Didion pic.twitter.com/hqXCAizoRN— Anthony Vincent (@AnthonyVnct) December 24, 2021
“Life changes in the instant. The ordinary instant. You sit down to dinner and life as you know it ends.” The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion ❤️ pic.twitter.com/M4bZ5aRZ4a— Paouline (@studioarchbasi2) December 24, 2021
Grief has no distance. Grief comes in waves, paroxysms, sudden apprehensions that weaken the knees and blind the eyes and obliterate the dailiness of life: Joan Didion, The Year Of Magical Thinking.#JoanDidionRIP— Soutik Biswas (@soutikBBC) December 24, 2021
— joan didion, on keeping a notebook pic.twitter.com/Eh42Jb0y3n— b ♡ (@shadesofheaven) December 24, 2021
A Twitter user wrote: “It is impossible to understand California without reading Joan Didion. She was the Joni Mitchell of journalism, cool enough to get invited to the party, self contained enough to get to stay. She would never pretend to be less smart. That may not sound like much now, but it was." It about sums up the coolness and intellectuality of the unabashed life lived by Didion.
It is impossible to understand California without reading Joan Didion. She was the Joni Mitchell of journalism, cool enough to get invited to the party, self contained enough to get to stay. She would never pretend to be less smart. That may not sound like much now, but it was. pic.twitter.com/lWCtR4tMpr— Pam Houston (@pam_houston) December 24, 2021
Joan Didion felt the joys of living as closely as the grief of it, which is perhaps a mutually inclusive affair. The literary world saw many great losses within the last month. Beloved author and feminist bell hooks passed away on December 15. Eve Babitz passed away within the last week. Anne Rice, the celebrated author of ‘Interview with the Vampire’, breathed her last on December 12, at the age of 80. Her son took to social media to announce the news that left fans heartbroken across the world: “Earlier tonight, my mother, Anne Rice, passed away due to complications resulting from a stroke. She left us almost nineteen years to the day my father, her husband Stan, died". Condolences poured in on her demise, and a quote from her on trans individuals, who are especially vulnerable to social media attacks, has been going viral ever since.
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