The Sons of Katie Elder

The Sons of Katie Elder is a movie starring John Wayne. It was the filming of this movie that Joan Didion writes about in her essay, "John Wayne: A Love Song."

C.P.U.S.A (M.-L.)

C.P.U.S.A (M.-L.) stands for the Communist Party U.S.A. (Marxist-Leninist). One of Didion's essays was about the General Secretary of this group.

Notebooks

Didion kept notes in notebooks since she was five, though she often was not sure to what the notes referred. Didion wrote several essays about this habit.

Slouching Toward Bethlehem

"Slouching Toward Bethlehem" is a line from a Yeats' poem that Didion chose as the title of one of her essays, and the name of the book, because the imagery of the poem haunted Didion for a long time prior to the publication of the book...