Joan Didion, the Death of R.F.K. and a Mystery Solved

June 8, 2023 7:38 AM

“We tell ourselves stories in order to live” "In the past, moments of national trauma had provided an opportunity for unity and cohesion. But Ms. Didion found herself confronted with a fractured version of America that’s not too different from the one we’ve come to recognize today. " Fascinating thought piece (NYT) about Joan Didion and Gregory Dunne's reaction to RFK's assasination while in Hawaii.
posted by j810c (16 comments total)

I remember that night all too well. After Eugene McCarthy surprised everyone with his 42% showing in the New Hampshire primary, Robert Kennedy jumped into the primaries and Lyndon Baines Johnson -- who I think would have been on some denomination of American currency by now had he not been saddled with the hopeless war in Vietnam: because the Civil Rights act -- dropped out immediately.

A lot of people loved McCarthy back then but I had pinned my hopes on RFK. He could have won. Like those of his brother, Martin Luther King Jr and the January 6th day of seditious treason, I will remember that day in detail forever: what I ate, where I fell asleep, how I slept and what I dreamt when I did. His assassination broke my heart.

And how I hate his anti-vaxer son RFK Jr, who besmirches a notable and historical name with his despicable existence imho, may I add.

Of course, I was likely a fool to think so but I was young -- 1968 was and is still my own personal annus horribilus. And still the most heartbreaking year of my life to date. First Martin Luther King Jr's, then Robert Kennedy's and then Nixon's election.

Well, wait -- when Hillary Clinton conceded to Donald Trump is the competing nadir to date: Nixon is St. Francis in comparison to Trump.
posted by y2karl at 8:42 AM on June 8, 2023 [12 favorites]

From the article:

“No matter what your political feelings are, if you’re attached to the idea of the nation as a community — if you feel yourself to be part of that community — then obviously something has happened to that community,” Ms. Didion told Ms. Stein of that night in 1968. “It seemed as if these people did not count themselves as part of the community. That they came from another America.” They could heckle a praying singer. They could watch “The Lawrence Welk Show” but ignore a political assassination. The same economic system that put these specific Americans in the position to take this vacation — the white-collar stability, the inequality sustaining it — was what allowed them, now, to turn their backs. They didn’t really care about any of it; the broader narrative of patriotism and pride was just an excuse for doing what they wanted — for their self-interest — a narrative they could apply and discard from one situation to the next as they saw fit.

The implications weighed heavily on Ms. Didion: How could this country continue to exist if the people who’d gained the most from it refused to contribute? How long until the dark pattern she and Mr. Dunne saw in Robert Kennedy’s murder reached its natural conclusion? It’s a sense of catastrophe — of that rough beast in the distance slouching closer — that, to many current Americans, feels strikingly familiar.

posted by mhum at 12:02 PM on June 8, 2023 [4 favorites]

If only the NYT's political and economic reporting were as astute and perceptive as the general news and arts coverage...
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 1:28 PM on June 8, 2023 [2 favorites]

@y2karl

As for me, I am just young enough to have no personal memories of the Kennedy Admin, and was aware of the RFK assassination the way an 8-year-old is aware of such things. What I know of the Kennedys comes from books, and RFK's service with the Other McCarthy looms large when I look at him.

Boomers who are older than me (e.g. my siblings) have a reverence for the memory of the Kennedys that I cannot fully understand.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 1:34 PM on June 8, 2023 [1 favorite]

from the article:
"One of the conventioneers jumped to his feet. “What are they singing a church song for?” he shouted. At his table and those surrounding, the other dry-cleaning salesmen and their wives chimed in: “What’s this church song for? Why a church song?” Clearly, they were drunk. For Ms. Didion the scene was surreal: the women with their big bouffant hairdos and flower leis; the men growing increasingly belligerent. Just then she noticed a young sailor nearby. He was sobbing."

Ah, America.

This part always tripped me out.
"(John) Frankenheimer was devastated by RFK's assassination in June 1968, due in part to his proximity to the event. He had first been scheduled to accompany Kennedy through the Ambassador Hotel after the candidate's victory speech in the California primaries. Early news reports listed Frankenheimer as one of the wounded in Kennedy's entourage. Frankenheimer and spouse Evans Evans were waiting at a side entrance of the Ambassador Hotel to pick up Kennedy when he emerged from the press conference and drive him to their home. According to Frankenheimer, they witnessed police removing Sirhan Sirhan, later convicted of the shooting, from the premises, then discovered Kennedy had been mortally wounded."
posted by clavdivs at 2:54 PM on June 8, 2023

Among his credits were Birdman of Alcatraz (1962), The Manchurian Candidate (1962), Seven Days in May (1964), The Train (1964), Seconds (1966), Grand Prix (1966), French Connection II (1975), Black Sunday (1977), The Island of Dr. Moreau (1996), and Ronin (1998).

Wow, that's a very impressive list of productiond, clavdivs, I had no idea.
posted by y2karl at 3:00 PM on June 8, 2023

when JFK was told that the book (Manchurian Candidate) was going to be made into a movie and that frankenheimer's going to make it, JFK asked:
"who's going to play the mother"
posted by clavdivs at 3:16 PM on June 8, 2023

Mother she wrote.
posted by y2karl at 3:55 PM on June 8, 2023

"Boomers who are older than me (e.g. my siblings) have a reverence for the memory of the Kennedys that I cannot fully understand." That reverence has been tempered by history and context. Of course I was very upset when JFK was assassinated and when RFK was killed. I did learn later through reading and talking with people who were my age that the Kennedy's were not gods and were not the epitome of greatness in politics and elsewhere.
posted by DJZouke at 5:08 AM on June 9, 2023

Boomers who are older than me (e.g. my siblings) have a reverence for the memory of the Kennedys that I cannot fully understand

What reverence? Spare me the long distance telepathy. Tne memory of crushed hopes from one's youth is not the same as reverence. Jimmy Carter aside, heroes of my youth almost always turned out to have feet of clay. And for the record, I myself prefer to quote someone's words rather than calling someone directly via pseudotwitteresque @personalnames crap. To my mind it's more polite. But that's just me.
posted by y2karl at 12:15 PM on June 9, 2023 [1 favorite]

I don't know where @y2karl was on 11/22/1963 and 6/6/1968 nor do I know how old you were then and are now. I don't know if "reverence" was the correct word for what I felt about the Kennedy's in the 1960's. I was merely repeating it. Perhaps I should have used a more precise word for what I felt then. What did we all know then? Not much other than TV, radio, newspapers and magazines. Jimmy Carter is a good person even though he lusted in his heart. Great president? These men were not my heroes. My heroes were my uncles who fought in combat during WWII. I have never looked up to any politician as a hero and never will. Your reference to lack of politeness is not very clear. Are you referring to what I wrote or the person whom I quoted?
posted by DJZouke at 2:38 PM on June 10, 2023

My heroes were my uncles who fought in combat during WWII.

Ah, the so-called Greatest Generation. Who, in my experience, had one word and one word only for black men, women and children. A word that began with an "N.' It was such an un-delight to listen to them go on and on 'them' during the Civil Rights era. Feet of clay to the ankles, knees and hips in variation on the topic.

Oddly enough, though, in the post World War II small Idaho town where I grew up, people had respect for the Nisei families who either spent the war either in the internment camps in Minidoka or the men who fought in the 442nd -- who came back to be the best farmers around. I only heard the 'J' word used once around that town and that came from a kid who never got to meet an uncle who died at Iwo Jima before he was born. People are such walking contradictions sometimes.
posted by y2karl at 3:21 PM on June 10, 2023

Also, Jimmy Carter.

Lieutenant Carter and his team received perhaps 1,000 times the dose of radiation now allowable.

Now there is a man we all can agree is a hero.
posted by y2karl at 3:33 PM on June 10, 2023

@y2karl too much toxicity here for me. You have your heroes and I have mine. All people are walking talking contradictions. End of thread for me. Over and out.
posted by DJZouke at 4:13 PM on June 10, 2023

One last note. I never heard any of my uncles on both sides of my family use the word. Though one uncle did use an Italian word to describe black people. I lost a very good friend who joined the Marines during the Vietnam War. He was shot up severely and the rest of his squad were killed. After he returned home he was not good. He turned it around, married and had a family. He counseled returning vets on gaining employment. He ultimately died of the wounds that he suffered in the war. My father took photos of bombing runs during WWII. He never flew in a plane again after he returned from the war. I know that I could never had done any of the things that these men experienced. It is easy for you to condemn my uncles as racists but I doubt very much that you could have faced what they went through. End of thread for good for me.
posted by DJZouke at 4:41 PM on June 10, 2023

End of thread for good for me.

You said that once already. I grew up in a small town in Idaho that had a sunset law on the books up through the 1960s and actually knew a Spanish-American war veteran when I was in grade school. I know what I heard the Greatest Generation say when I was a kid. Your mileage seems to have varied.
posted by y2karl at 8:34 AM on June 16, 2023