James Pike, American Summary and Analysis

In the second essay of the book "The White Album", Joan Didion studies the account of the life and death of James Albert Pike, Bishop of California during the Sixties and Seventies. This essay is the first of Part Two of the book, entitled aptly 'The Californian Republic'.

The title of this Part in which the majority of the essays of the novel are contained gives us an immediate clue of what this essay is about and hints at a theme of the entire book. 'The Californian Republic' conjures the image of a place that it similar to paradise, a heaven on Earth that Joan Didion is dissecting. Her choice of James Pike as its first representative is important to note as well: that whilst she studies California and America, she does so through the lives of...