Didion, the essayist who anatomized and often eviscerated the '60s, was successful and venerated for most of her career; Babitz, who captured everything sordid and beautiful about Los Angeles, had a more troubled life and career.
Lili Anolik's new book, Didion and Babitz, a dishy gloss on the pair, purports to be interested in pushing past persona and performance to find the truth, the humans underneath.
The photographer Julian Wasser turned both into literal icons; Didion leaning on her Daytona-yellow 1969 Corvette Stingray, Babitz playing chess in the nude with a fully clothed Marcel Duchamp.
Gossip has always been regarded as some devious woman's trick, and yet how are people like me-women they're called-supposed to understand things if we can't get into the V.I.P. room?
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