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In time of trouble, I had been trained since childhood, read, learn, work it up, go to the literature. Information was control. Given that grief remained the most general of afflictions its literature seemed remarkably spare.

In chapter 4, Didion discusses how she read as much as possible about grief as a way of understanding and contextualizing her responses to John’s death. Didion examines her reactions as a writer and reporter would, conducting initial research to develop an informed perspective from which she can make critical judgments. Didion approaches her own grief from a place of intellectual inquiry, hoping that, by acquiring information, she will not only better understand her emotional experience but will also acquire the tools with which she can manage the situation. With an informed perspective, Didion believes she can avoid being passively subject to her own emotions. Instead, she will gain a measure of control and be better equipped to cope with the consequences of her husband’s death. Over the course of the book, Didion acts both as a student engaged in a process of self-education and as a detective, piecing together clues to understand the cause of John’s death in order to go back in time to change the outcome.

Didion discovers that despite the fact that grief is a common experience, very little has been written about it. Her intention had been to submerge herself in the available literature as a way of creating a network of reference points, which would allow her to frame her situation and outline available courses of action. Instead, she finds a limited body of texts that prevent her from fully understanding the range and complexity of grief experiences. By writing The Year of Magical Thinking, Didion not only contributes to the existing body of grief literature but also documents the other sources available, thereby creating a canon of grief literature. Even though the existing body of work is relatively limited, she still finds that it gives her a beginning set of ideas and definitions with which she can analyze her own experiences. The book itself, rather than the research, evolves into an intellectual project that allows her to quantify and analyze her experience.

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