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Summary Of Los Angeles Notebook

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Joan Didion’s essay “Los Angeles Notebook portrays the Santa Ana winds as being ominus, unseen, and foreboding, by having characters in the story view the winds as an omen of evil inhabitants. She also helps to convey this by changing her sentence length and structure to better suit the atmosphere for the effect the she wants her writings to take on the reader. From the start of her writing, Didion did something to make her story more interesting, that really need to be rooted out. She manipulated the sentence structure and changed their lengths to either make them more long and drawn out, or when she wanted to build tension, she would make the sentences increasingly choppy and short-worded. There are many instances …show more content…

From the beginning of her writing, her word choice and placement of such words are a key part of the intended effect that was wanted for the story. One of the main characteristics that she gives to the winds continues and builds throughout the story making them into an omen, and a sign of something much more than a harsh gale. The winds are an invisible yet ever present part of the psyche of the valley's inhabitants. Didion states that”There are a number of persistent malevolent winds.” These winds carry a darkness with them that is not understood or seen, but still lurks. Built in to this paper is the massive belief in superstitions of all kinds related to the winds. She states that ”In Switzerland the suicide rate goes up during the foehn, and in the courts of some swiss cantons the winds is considered a mitigating circumstance for crime. Surgeons are said to watch the wind, because blood doesn't clot normally during the foehn.” With the amount of things that are said to inevitably go wrong during the time when these winds are blowing, all of the residents are fraying at the mysterious nature of these hot gales. The only ‘logical explanation’ for these winds being a change in the ratio of negative and positive ions that are in the air at the

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