Monday, April 18, 2011

Joan Didion, Some Dreamers of the Golden Dream

In Joan Didion’s piece entitled Some Dreamers of the Golden Dream, she talks about the story of Lucille Miller. Lucille allegedly murdered her husband by burning him alive in a car on the side of a ghostly road in California. In the end Lucille was convicted and sent to jail for the murder, the piece makes me question whether she was actually innocent or guilty. Didion has an interesting writing style, she is very descriptive, and likes to build things up to present the ultimate climax in her writing.  She takes a case that was probably presented in the media as Lucille being 100 percent guilty, to making you question the validity of the verdict. Didion sets the tone describing the beautiful serene California landscape, just how someone may picture it. California is a place where anything can happen and where dreams come true. Joan Didion shows the other side of the golden land of California, with violence and murders. She seems to bring out the truth beneath the dream, after all Lucille’s dream wasn’t different from anyone else in California, she just wanted to rise up a few rings on the social ladder.
As an outsider I picture California as a perfect place to be with palm trees, hot girls in bikinis, people that are rich and of high status, and the possibility to achieve anything. That is only how I picture California, I’m sure most people who have not been there do not have too much of a different image in their head either. 99 percent of the stories that you hear about of rags to riches celebrities includes a part where someone moves to California and gets discovered. It is not often you hear someone say
“Don’t go to California, it’s a bad place to live, sure it may be beautiful but I would not recommend it.”
To me, I see Didion’s style as just reassuring that wherever you go nothing will ever be perfect. Even the place where the golden dream can come true, it can diminish just as easily. I take that and apply it to anywhere I picture myself living in a dream world, weather its Miami, Aspen, or Banyan Street, shit happens. You can be in the most beautiful setting and witness your worst nightmare. I have never heard of the story of Lucille Millar before reading this piece and after reading it, I felt that Lucille Millar was innocent and should not have been sent to jail. This just shows the power of Didion’s writing style and how it can influence a reader like me to go against the justice system and believe the opposite of what they believe. I’m not even sure she intended to make her readers believe that Lucille was innocent but that is how I interpreted the piece. Everyone interoperates things differently, that’s what makes all humans unique.

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