Joan Didion autograph collection

During my videotaping career for Columbia University and C-SPAN in New York City, I had the opportunity to videotape yet another award-winning author, Joan Didion. I did so on four different occasions in 2001-2007. In this Hub I reveal the images of the programs or other materials I had Ms. Didion sign and provide links to a couple of the programs she was featured at, and a few of her books. Enjoy.

The dates I covered Joan Didion:

On November 5, 2001, when she was interviewed by New York Times columnist Frank Rich at the Council On Foreign Relations about her book Political Fictions and the recent terrorist attacks. It was captured on video for replay on Book TV.

On May 4, 2006, when she was awarded the Columbia Presbyterian Heath Sciences Advisory Council Award for Distinguished Service - for sharing her grief and experiences and the family’s medical experiences in her best-selling book, The Year of Magical Thinking. It raised public awareness on important medical conditions and their impact on the lives of those dealing with similar issues.

On October 25, 2006 when she presented the 30^th Annual Alexander Ming Fisher Lecture (on Death and Dying) at the College of Physicians & Surgeons at Columbia University Medical Center.

And on November 14, 2007, when she was presented the National Book Foundation's Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. It took place at the National Book Awards Dinner and Ceremony at the Marriott Marquis.

More about Joan Didion: She is the author of five novels, Run River, Play It as It Lays, A Book of Common Prayer, Democracy, and The Last Thing He Wanted, and eight books of non-fiction, including Political Fictions and The Year of Magical Thinking. She is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2005 she won the National Book Award in Nonfiction for The Year of Magical Thinking (a memoir of coping with the grief resulting from her daughter’s long, lingering illness and sudden death of her husband), and in 2007 the American Academy of Arts and Letters Gold Medal in Criticism and Belles Letters.

She has also collaborated on screenplays with her husband John Gregory Dunne for films including The Panic in Needle Park with Al Pacino, True Confessions with Robert DeNiro and Robert Duvall, A Star is Born with Barbra Streisand and Up Close and Personal with Michelle Pfeiffer and Robert Redford.

Ms. Didion is presently writing a new memoir (about aging). Titled, Blue Nights, it will be released on November 1, 2011.

It was an honor to meet her, capture some of her New York City area appearances on video and gather her autograph six times.