Grief and Reality

Most of us, even those who have lost someone close – be they family members, spouse, or other – have not experienced the kind of tragedy Joan Didion suffers in The Year of Magical Thinking. Imagine the situation: your (happy and recently wedded) child is suddenly hospitalized, is in critical condition, and you have been standing by her side vigilantly, seeing little improvement, hoping against hope that she recovers; then, after a grueling night of this, you go home and sit down to dinner where your husband proceeds to have a massive coronary – right before your very eyes – and dies on the spot. Who has experienced reality on such harsh terms? And furthermore, who wouldn’t want to believe that what happened wasn’t real? Of course Didion seems “detached” and fails to accept John’s death at first. Her logical thinking and emoting capacities were severely limited, if not predominantly shut down. This is why the doctors at New York Hospital (where John’s body was taken) deemed her a “cool customer”; the woman was in shock. To make these matters worse, Quintana later seems to improve, only to fall ill again and has to undergo brain surgery. This is life – reality – pulling out the rug from Didion once again. The fact that Didion has been accustomed to a relatively privileged life may not make her a more likeable character, but it may be at least a small factor in why she is in such disbelief. Didion refers to this in the first lines of the book with, “The question of self pity.” Some of us may have thought this very thing, just differently. As in, “Why me?”
But Didion is far from helpless. She wants control and laments that some things in life are “beyond [her] ability to control or manage[...]” This is a theme throughout her work: the urge to mend the ills of herself and her loved ones. This is not then, some sort of detachment. This is her way of coping. She further fulfills this desire to control by learning all she can about Quintana’s condition, the circumstances surrounding John’s death, and everything else relevant to her situation, including how to grieve. This woman is connected to these events and connected intensely. It’s reality she has to grasp at, and she does so by stating things the only way she knows how; that is, factually and unflinchingly.