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Salon does a disservice to its readers by publishing an interview written in such dense New York Review of Books insider-ese. I'm a reasonable literate person, but to me Didion is little more than a name. Such a review should help dispel my ignorance, not flaunt the reviewer's memkbership in an esoteric guild.
One other detail in O'hehir's review cannot be allowed to pass without comment: she says that she will not quote from Didion's memoir because every reader has her "own Didion." Everyone who has ever submitted a book report without reading the book in question recognizes that for the transparent ploy it is; why pay writers like O'Hehir to review books at all?
