Only now do we know the full story of a moment in "The White Album" that makes it still so relevant.
In the past, moments of national trauma provided an opportunity for unity and cohesion. But Ms. Didion found herself confronted with a fractured version of America that's not too different from the one we've come to recognize today. |
 | | Illustration by Vanessa Stevens; photographs by John Bryson and Bettmann Collection |
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The best research discoveries are often incidental. For years I had been absorbed in a book project on Bobby Kennedy that I'd recently begun to lose faith in. Finally, in January, I drove to Boston: I hoped that a visit to the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library, to the oral history collections housed there, would refocus my efforts. |
Exploring the archive, I came upon an interview with the writer Joan Didion and her husband, John Gregory Dunne. My project focused on the 1968 California presidential primary, and few writers have captured that time and that place better than Didion. But unlike many of the collection's other interviews, hers was listed as audio only, no transcript. |
I asked if a digital recording was available and forgot about it until, preparing to leave, I received an email from the archivist. "It's your lucky day," the message read. The interview, she explained, had already been digitized, and since none of the participants were still living, it was now available to the public. |
I played it from my phone as I drove back through Boston, astonished. For the first time, Didion recounted the full story behind a cryptic line in her seminal essay "The White Album": "I watched Robert Kennedy's funeral on a veranda at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel in Honolulu." |
My recent guest essay connects the dots between this new information and another personal moment Didion referred to in "The White Album": a nervous breakdown she suffered that same summer. |
That day in Boston, I walked into the library looking for Bobby Kennedy and left instead with Joan Didion. Both offer a glimpse into the turmoil of that time and place. But with Didion we see the long view. It's a perspective that today feels as relevant as ever. |
| READ TIMOTHY'S FULL ESSAY HERE | | |
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