Quotes Live Forever

Today’s New York Post reported that a new postal forever stamp, dedicated to Maya Angelou, carries a quote that is not actually hers.

The article caught  my eye because I have gained so much strength from Ms. Angelou’s writing.  In fact, most mornings I include one of her inspirational quotes in my Twitter feed.

Her quotes inspire me every bit as much as I hope they inspire others.

The author to whom the quote actually belongs, Joan Walsh Anglund, told the Washington Post that the quote originated with her in a 1967 children’s book of poems, entitled “A Cup of Sun.”

Judging by the news reports, the 89-year-old Ms. Anglund harbors no resentment toward either Ms. Angelou or the creators of the stamp.

Referring to Maya Angelou, Ms. Anglund said, “I love her and all she’s done, and I also love my own private thinking . . .”

On the one hand, then, it’s a compliment to have a thought so profound that others consciously or unconsciously claim it over time as their own.

On the other, a pattern of words, a choreography of phrases in a poem, are a poet’s legacy, and it is important that Ms. Anglund be given the credit that is rightly hers.

In this instance, the quote should forever be attributed to the one who originally made music out of a magical arrangement of words.

 

The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion

A Most Eloquent Take on Grief

Life changes fast.

Life changes in the instant.  

Photo of The Year of Magical Thinking
The Year of Magical Thinking

You sit down to dinner and life as you know it ends.

The question of self-pity.”

These were the first words Joan Didion wrote after it happened,  as she tells us in the first line after these words in her amazing book,  The Year of Magical Thinking.

The “it” in the follow-up words to the first words refers to her husband, John Dunne’s, death.

That these words appear at the very start of this remarkable homage to grief is important, as they are repeated in various renditions throughout the book.

Joan Didion’s husband, with whom she had shared most moments of most of her adult life, had died of a massive heart attack, just as they had sat down to dinner, and hence, the reference to life changing in an instant.

Owning My Own Grief

My own mother’s death, though extraordinarily premature, did not happen in an instant.  We had not just sat down to dinner when life as I knew it ended.

In fact, my mother was sick for much of my teenage years, and lost her valiant fight against breast cancer a mere two weeks after I turned 18.

Joan Didion struggled to come to terms with getting through the remainder of her years without the man with whom she had spent most of her life.

I, on the other hand, have spent most of my life without my mother–sometimes coming to terms with that fact better than at other times.

Joan Didion’s Way With Words

Joan Didion is the author of five novels, and one of America’s most celebrated authors.   She is so skilled a writer that she makes it safe for us to look up close and personal at a subject as potentially overwhelming as grief.

It’s almost if we’re all taking this journey through the first year after Joan Didion’s husband died–together.

The Power of Day

Days play a vital role in the story of the year following the death of Joan Didion’s husband.

We learn, for instance, of the importance of the day an editor came to dinner in so far as her husband was alive on that day.  Holidays are merely a few of the other powerful ways in which Ms. Didion used the concept of days to help her make sense of the reality of her life partner leaving her just as they were sitting down to dinner.

With eloquence and grace, defiance and acceptance, Ms. Didion deftly tells us–and surely herself– how she ultimately came to terms with her husband’s death.