Didions Suggestions About the Past in Relation to the Present in On Going Home
Didion’s suggestions about the past and it’s relation to the present in “On Going Home” The affects of World War II caused a breakdown of tradition among homes across America in the 1950’s. In “On Going Home,” Joan Didion explains how the quality of life in times before the war can only be captured through her memory. In paragraph 1, Didion describes her definition of home as a word to depict a concept that is not characteristic of values in modern society. In paragraph 2, she expresses her frustrations of being the last of a post World War II generation and in paragraph 3 she attempts to build a connection between the past and present. In paragraphs 4 and 5, Didion confronts her past as she visits an old family graveyard and her great-aunts. ... In paragraph 1, Didion suggests that “home” does not indicate a place, but it is a concept. She states “[b]y ‘home’ I do not mean the house in Los Angeles where my husband and I and the baby live, but the place where my family is, in the Central Valley of California.