We Tell Ourselves Stories

Joan Didion and the American Dream Machine

By: Alissa Wilkinson

Narrated by: Alissa Wilkinson

In this riveting cultural biography, New York Times film critic Alissa Wilkinson examines Joan Didion's influence through the lens of American mythmaking. As a young girl, Didion was infatuated with John Wayne and his on-screen bravado, and was fascinated by her California pioneer ancestry and the infamous Donner Party. The mythos that preoccupied her early years continued to influence her work as a magazine writer and film critic in New York, offering glimmers of the many stories Didion told herself that would come to unravel over the course of her career. But out west, show business beckoned.

We Tell Ourselves Stories eloquently traces Didion's journey from New York to her arrival in Hollywood as a screenwriter at the twilight of the old studio system. She spent much of her adult life deeply embroiled in the glitz and glamour of the Los Angeles elite, where she acutely observed—and denounced—how the nation's fears and dreams were sensationalized on screen. Meanwhile, she paid the bills writing movie scripts like A Star Is Born, while her books propelled her to celestial heights of fame.

Peering through a scrim of celluloid, Wilkinson incisively dissects the cinematic motifs and machinations that informed Didion's writing—and how her writing, ultimately, demonstrated Hollywood's addictive grasp on the American imagination.

©2025 Alissa Wilkinson (P)2025 Highbridge Audio

Interesting Approach to Didion but narration lacki

The "film" angle on Didion's life is intriguing and works except for the "super hero" section where it's unconvincing. Good job of putting scope of her life in perspective.

Fascinating

I enjoyed listening to the author read her own book. I loved the premise: looking at Didion's life and works through the lense of 20th Century America: politcs, Hollywood, and the unsettling stories that define the American imagination. This was an interesting and insightful read.