The Year of Magical Thinking

Didion’s work draws upon the trope of the links between madness and grief often found in literature. She explains that literature is her source of comfort and inspiration when the events of her life are especially challenging. She explains that the ancient Greek conception of “theia mania” refers to “divine madness” which is less connected to mental illness and more closely resembles a type of altered consciousness. Didion’s work exhibits both mental illness and altered consciousness. The term “madness” can be stigmatizing for individuals with mental illness, but Didion’s use of the term is meant to represent her own disordered thinking as she struggles with the death of her husband. She questions why grief is not viewed as a form of mental illness when it alters the state of consciousness for the mourner. Didion loses her ability to construct and order memory and time, as well as her ability to think rationally and accept the loss of her husband.

Didion also questions whether grief and faith are the same thing. For Didion, faith is the exertion of irrationality. When a theologian suggests to Didion that ritual is a type of faith, she is angry. She did the rituals; she did not put away her husband’s shoes or read his obituaries, but he did not return. Didion finds more comfort in the practical. She turns to books about grieving to learn about her experiences. She is most comforted by Emily Post’s pragmatic advice in Etiquette. She pores over research and medical journals. However, her rational mind cannot help but be ruled by the irrational mind. She can see how grief has eliminated her reasoning, but she is unable to override it.

Didion suggests that the months after her husband’s passing left her in a state of duality: the outward appearance that she is a “cool customer” (15) and the interior reality that she is unable to accept that her husband is gone. She discovers that pathological bereavement can occur when two people are unusually dependent upon one another, a description which Didion suggests may describe her relationship with Dunne. The delayed funeral brought on by her daughter’s illness also disconnects Didion from a traditional grieving process, creating a scenario in which Didion can suspend belief in her husband’s death and expect his return.

As the memoir progresses, Didion’s thinking becomes increasingly disordered. She is unable to answer a simple crossword clue because grief has overridden her system. Throughout the memoir, Didion points to several examples of her loss of basic cognition because of her grief. For example, the autopsy report arrives eleven months after Dunne’s death because, on the day the ambulance rushed him to the hospital, Didion had given the address of their first home from 1964. Even a year after her husband’s death, Didion discovers new ways in which her cognition continues to fail her. She tries to write something, but she struggles to complete it. When she finally finishes the piece, it is riddled with errors. Didion is burdened by this temporary “madness,” but she is also hesitant to leave it behind, as to do so feels like a betrayal to the memory of her husband. At the end of the book, Didion expresses that she is not ready yet, although she has begun to accept the necessity of moving forward.