Didion, Joan

The American author Joan Didion was born and grew up in Sacramento, California, where her family had been living for five generations. Her father was a businessman. Joan Didion studied at the University of California at Berkeley, where she took a degree in 1956, majoring in English Literature. In the same year she moved to New York. She had won a readers' competition at Vogue. The first prize was an apprenticeship at the magazine's editorial department. Didion stayed until 1963, but also freelanced for The New Yorker, National Review, Mademoiselle and other magazines. In 1964, she married the author John Gregory Dunne (1932-2003) and moved to Los Angeles. They later returned to New York, though. Together with her husband, she worked as a columnist for several American magazines. They also wrote film scripts together. From 1975, Joan Didion was also frequent guest lecturer at Berkeley.