Bill Nighy

So I hope you like it.

Remember, you don't have to make a note of these things because they're all in the show notes and there's a link to Spotify.

This episode's book, or book of the week, is by Joan Didion.

I've read everything, I think, by Joan Didion.

And this one is called Where I Was From.

And she's from Sacramento in California.

She's a wonderful writer.

I struggled with the decision about which of her books I should choose.

And I've chosen this because it might persuade you into reading other of her books because she writes so beautifully.

But also, it's a very singular book and it's a very...

It's kind of what you need to know about America before you start.

And this is a short passage from it.

100 years ago, our great-great-grandparents were pushing America's frontier westward to California.

That's a quote.

So began the speech I wrote to deliver at my eighth grade graduation from the Arden School outside Sacramento.

The subject was our California heritage.

Developing a theme encouraged by my mother and grandfather, I continued, made rather more confident than I should have been by the fact that I was wearing a new dress, pale green organdy and my mother's crystal necklace.

It was in June 1948.

The pale green of the organdy dress was a colour that existed in the local landscape only for the few spring days when the rice first showed.

The crystal necklace was considered by my mother an effective way to counter the valley heat.