Financial Management Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 4000 words

Financial Management - Assignment Example In this research we analyzed how the company could revive its position with the growth rate of 20% in revenues and would be the future impact of investment decisions and losses made at Kuwait by the company1. Research Methodology The research employs secondary research methodology for analyzing data and reaching conclusions. High emphasis had been laid on studying the annual statements of the company, e-journals, financial books and magazines. Organizational Background Industry Background The market research industry has grown globally into a number of areas and sectors including financial research, business research and marketing research. Companies like Grail Research, Global Insight and ICRA are one of the top most companies in this field globally. Companies with the help of innovative and latest technologies along with the use of various business tools, come up with results that are practical and profitable for many other companies. Also companies in this industry employ various pricing and differential strategies to be ahead of competition2. Company Information Synovate FZ-LLC is a market research consultancy in Dubai. It is a free zone company registered with limited liability pursuant to regulations issues by Dubai Government and Media Free Zone Private Regulations, 2003. The company current has revenues of AED 27.24 million with net loss of AED -5.4 million in 2008. The company is also having going concern issues currently. This is primarily due to negative equity of AED 6.6 million of the company along with the operating losses described above. The product and services of the company are basically related to industry research. The company has offices in over 60 countries and operates as a global brand in global market research firm3. Mission The mission of Synovate FZ-LLC is to showcase how market research is deriving changes in an enterprise, the market place as well as the society. Services As discussed earlier the company is into marketing research. The product and services of the company are basically related to industry research. The company has offices in over 60 countries and operates as a global brand in global market research firm. The company researches various companies, sector and industry for new investment opportunities of for some other specified reason. My Role I worked with Synovate FZ-LLC as a sales executive and I am in direct contact with the management team of the company and have thereby utilized my knowledge, experience and relationship for building this proposal. Financial Management The objectives of financial management are to maximise owners wealth by â€Å"Planning, directing, monitoring, organizing, and controlling of the monetary resources of an organization†4. To achieve the above definition, financial management involves the following: 1. Financial Planning and control: how the resources will be managed effectively in order to achieve the financial objectives. 2. Managing of working capital: managing day to day operations, this includes managing current assets components: Cash and

Relation to the Socio-Political Essay Example for Free

Relation to the Socio-Political Essay Comparison and Contrast of the General Tones of the Sumerian and Egyptian Hymns, in Relation to the Socio-Political and Geographic History of these Nations It is interesting to note that the Egyptian and Sumerian civilizations both sprung up beside rivers: Egypt lies in the delta of the Nile while the Sumerian civilization was on the fertile Mesopotamia along the banks of Tigris and Euphrates. It is thus expected that both civilizations revere their river, and associate them with gods, because the rivers prove to be vital to their existence and a channel of life for them. These forces of nature are considered holy and addressed by prayers. Examples of such pleas can be found in both hymns â€Å"A Sumero-Akadian Prayer to Every God† and the â€Å"Hymn to the Nile. † In these prayers, however, we find very different attitudes of the early people towards their gods. In the Sumero-Akadian prayer we will read a tone of sorrow, grief and fear by a troubled soul over his offences with the gods. The introduction fearfully desire for peace with the divinity: â€Å"May the fury of my lords heart be quieted toward me. † Throughout the text we will also find out that the gods are not named, but is rather just sanctified as an existing being that may not be offended. This apparent fear of the divinity may be attributed to the structure of the Mesopotamian civilizations, where the land was divided into different city-states believed to be owned by a deity. The Sumerian state is therefore not a solid state, but is a conglomeration of small states. Consistent fear of invasion made them turn into the divine beings for protection and blessing. As a further note, in the Sumero-Akadian civilizations, the power of government is divided into two: the lugal took care of the military powers and the even more powerful ensi was the supreme religious leader who also controlled â€Å"economic and technological expertise† (Krejci and Krejcova, p. 31). It can therefore be seen that the fear of the gods was the way of the ensi to maintain political control over his dominions. Political and social structure in Egypt proved much different from the Sumerians. The whole of Egypt was controlled by only one ruler – the Pharaohs. This unity gave the Egyptians more control over their surroundings and their country. Early on, the Egyptians had a clear sense of identity (Kemp, p. 25). This control is best exemplified by their ability to time and control the flooding of the Nile. However, geographically, the Egyptians were not as lucky as the Sumerians, as they were surrounded by deserts. This made them consider the Nile as a gift from the gods, a means by which they would live. It is therefore not surprising that the â€Å"Hymn to the Nile† is a joyous song of praise. The overall theme of the hymn is perhaps best stated in the first lines: â€Å"Hail to thee, O Nile! Who manifests thyself over this land, and comes to give life to Egypt!† References Mircea Eliade `From Primitives to Zen`: A SUMERO-AKADIAN PRAYER Ancient History Sourcebook:Hymn to the Nile, c. 2100 BCE Jaroslav Krejci, Anna Krejcova (1990). Before the European Challenge: The Great Civilizations of Asia and the Middle East. SUNY Press. Barry J. Kemp (2006). Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization, 2nd Ed. Routledge

Limitations of Access Control Lists in Network Security

Limitations of Access Control Lists in Network Security On the Limitations of Access Control Lists (ACL’s) in Network Security In basic security parlance, the Access Control List (ACL) directly determines which parties can access certain sensitive areas of the network. Usually, there are several. One enables general access to the network, which includes non-sensitive information about company policy and operations (Verma 2004). Access is granted to a general audience and all personnel within the organisation. Confidential files and sensitive data, however, would only be available to a limited number of people, which would be specified. Such delicate information is often only available when accessing a certain terminal. For example, our hypothetical travel agency will allow only the network manager on a particular terminal to PING the proxy servers from the internal LAN as well as deny connections from the Internet to those hosts with private source IP addresses. As with any company, the travel agency wishes to protect its sensitive information from hackers and fellow competitors. The network administrator cr eated ACL’s congruent with the company’s security policy. However, additional protocols will need to be implemented in order to offer the agency the full protection it needs. The purpose of this essay is to highlight the vulnerabilities and limitations of the ACL and suggest supplementary protocols to ensure tighter security. Peter Davis (2002) identified six vulnerabilities of the ACL in the context of testing Cisco’s routers. First, because the ACL will not block the non-initial fragments of a packet, then the router will fail to block all unauthorized traffic. ‘By sending an offending traffic in packet fragments, it is possible to circumvent the protection offered by the ACL’ (Davis 2002). Secondly, if one were to send packet fragment traffic to the router, it is likely that there would be a denial-of-service on the router itself. This is because the router fails to acknowledge the keyword fragment when a user sends a packet specifically to the router (Davis 2002). Third, there is the odd phenomenon of the unresponsive router. ‘The router ignores the implicit deny ip any any rule at the end of an ACL when you apply an ACL of exactly 448 entries to an interface as an outgoing ACL’ (Davis 2002). The result of this would compromise the integrity of network security, as the ACL will not drop the packets. Fourth, modern routers allow support for the fragment keyword on an outbound ACL. In previous models, only the inbound ACL provided support for this keyword while ignoring the outbound ACL (Davis 2002). Fifth, the outbound ACL may fail to prevent unauthorized traffic on a router when the administrator configures an input ACL on some interfaces of the multi-port Engine 2 line card. ‘Any ACL you apply at the ingress point will work as expected and block the desired traffic. This vulnerability can cause unwanted traffic in and out of the protected network’ (Davis 2002). Last of all, even the fragment keyword is not sufficient to get the ACL to filter packet fragments, which would enable an individual or corporation to exploit this weakness—attacking systems that are supposed to be shielded by the ACL on the router (Davis 2002). To avoid many of these pitfalls, Davis recommends that administrators routinely filter packet fragments. Although filtering may be useful, it is insufficient in preventing security breaches according to Kasacavage and Yan (2002). Without supplementary processes, packet filtering will fail to identify the originator of the data, and it would fail to prevent a user from gaining access to a network behind the router. Thus, the creation of extended ACL’s along with the standard is very important. ‘Standard ACL’s can only filter based on the source address and are numbered 0 through 99’(Prosise Mandia, p. 429). Extended ACL’s, in contrast, can filter a greater variety of packet characteristics and are numbered 100-199. In other words, each object is supposed to enforce its unique access control policy (Sloot 1999). For instance, the ACL commands are applied in order of precedence and the second rule will not allow the packets denied by the first rule, even if the second rule does permit that (Prosise Mandia). Filling in the Gaps One recommendation for securing a private network is to use a firewall such as a DMZ LAN. Essentially, it does not have any connections save the router and firewall connections (Kasacavage Yan 2002). This would force all packets of all networks (public and private) to flow through the firewall. This greatly diminishes the breaches common in security systems employing mainly ACL’s as direct unprotected connection with the Internet is judiciously avoided. The problem with the router mentioned by Davis in the previous section was its failure to filter packets going in one direction, or outbound ACL’s with specific identifiers. Installing a firewall at each locus connected to the Internet is highly recommended (Kasacavage Yan 2002). Like most aspects of technology, the ACL must be updated quite frequently. However, this gives the individual employed in this task a high degree of latitude, which is why access to this function must be strictly controlled (Liu Albitz 2006). ‘In order to use dynamic updates, you add an allow-update or update-policy substatement to the zone statement of the zone that you’d like to make updates to†¦it’s prudent to make this access control list as restrictive as possible’ (Liu Albitz 2006, p. 232). As wireless communications technology continues to revolutionize the way people do business, another issue that will concern security administrators is the increase of wireless LAN attacks that result in the loss of proprietary information and a loss of reputation as customers become leery of a company that can easily lose personal data (Rittinghouse Ransome 2004). Most wireless networks identify individual users via the Service Set Identifier (SSID) in such a way that would repel wireless LAN attacks that greatly compromise network security by using the ACL that comes standard with WLAN equipment. Because all devices have a Media Access Control (MAC) address, ‘the ACL can deny access to any device not authorized to access the network’ (Rittinghouse Ransome 2004, p. 126). However, other host-based intrusion detection software such as Back Orifice, NukeNabber, and Tripwire are also instrumental in preventing these attacks. In sum, although it would be impossible to create an impregnable security system, it is necessary to ensure that the system one employs is extremely difficult to breach, with very little profit for their troubles. By identifying the six most significant issues ACL’s face and exploring other ways that network administrators can close the gaps, more sophisticated security protocols can be put into operation. However, while security systems are correcting their weaknesses, computing experts on either side of the law are still finding ways to circumvent them. Controlling access to sensitive data is a necessity in any network, even in an informal file-sharing network. With the enclosed ACL’s, the agency shall be able to successfully diminish its odds of a security breach. Bibliography Davis, P.T. (2002), Securing and controlling Cisco routers, London: CRC Press. [Online at books.google.com] Kasacavage, V. Yan, W. (2002), Complete Book of Remote Access: Connectivity and Security, London: CRC Press Liu, C. Albitz, P. (2006), DNS and BIND: Fifth Edition, Sebastopol, CA: O’Reilly Media Inc. Prosise, C. Mandia, K. (2003), Incident Response Computer Forensics, New York: McGraw Hill Professional Rittinghouse, J.W. Ransome, J.F. (2004), Wireless Operational Security, Oxford: Digital Press Sloot, P., Bubak, M., Hoekstra, A. Hertzberger, R. (1999), High-Performance Computing and Networking, New York: Springer Verma, D.C. (2004), Legitimate Applications of Peer-to-Peer Networks, Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley Sons

Half Brothers - How far can you sympathise with Helen, Gregory, William :: English Literature

Half Brothers - How far can you sympathise with Helen, Gregory, William Preston and the narrator of the tale? How does Elizabeth Gaskell guide your response? HALF BROTHERS How far can you sympathise with Helen, Gregory, William Preston and the narrator of the tale? How does Elizabeth Gaskell guide your response? Out of all of the characters in the story, I think that Helen and Gregory are the two that are easiest to sympathise with. William Preston is a harder character to sympathise with. The way that Elizabeth Gaskell portrays these characters in the tale, is a great influence on these thoughts. From beginning to end, Helen seems to have led a very tragic life. The start of the story consists of a very depressing amount of death and poverty and this could trigger a sympathetic reaction from the reader. After three years with her first husband, he dies of tuberculosis and leaves her with a young child, barely able to walk and many burdens such as a lease on their farm that she is stuck with for another four years. As if that wasn't enough, half of the stock on the farm was dead and the rest had to be sold to deal with 'more pressing debts'. All this made her life very difficult as there was no immediate source of income. The way all of this information is provided to the reader is also a reason for the quantity of sympathy generated for Helen. All of these tragic events in Helen's life are included in one single sentence. This gives the reader the impression that all these events happened within a very short time of each other. This would generate even more sympathy for Helen. Immediately after this one, massive sentence full of tragedy, and financial problems, Elizabeth Gaskell reveals that Helen is expecting another child. Here, a lot of emotive language is used, like 'sad and sorry' that trigger sympathy. Terms like 'lonesome dwelling' are also included. This suggests that Helen leads a very lonely, sad life. With winter approaching, Helen's future looks very bleak. At this point, Helen's sister 'Fanny' goes to stay at the farm to keep her company and help out. They planned ways to make money and for a short time, Helen's life began to look up. However, soon, Helen's daughter took ill of scarlet fever and within a week, she died. At this point, Helen was described as stunned by this blow. The fact that Helen did not cry almost gave the impression that Helen was so used to death that she had been 'hardened' by past experiences.

A Good Man Is Hard to Find: Grandmother Is the Central Character

A Good Man is Hard to Find The grandmother is the central character in the short story â€Å"A Good Man is Hard to Find,† by Flannery O’Connor. She is also a very well rounded and dynamic character. She shows various characteristics and reveals various remarks as they story progresses. Some of her qualities include selfish and a pushy person. She is also kind of manipulator in a way that she insists her family to change the plan. At the beginning of the story when we first realize her desire to visit her childhood house, she is being a very selfish person. Examining her conversation with her son Bailey, the grandmother is moreover a pushy person. She is convincing Bailey to change the trip plan according to her need only and which will benefit her only. She is trying to manipulate her family to do what she thinks is best. She is also a bit of criticizer at points in the story. Her characteristics remain same throughout the story that is even when her desire was ignored, she still kept praising it. The story opens up with a conversation between the grandmother and her son Bailey about their trip to Florida. Instead of going to Florida with her entire family, she insists on visiting her relatives up in Tennessee. In spite of everyone’s choice, she just wants to go where her mind is set. It is very obvious that she is only concerned about her gaining and nobody else’s. Her selfishness occurs when she says â€Å"The children have been to Florida before† (O’Connor 345). It sounds like the grandmother is being stubborn and childish, and trying to change their mind about going to Tennessee. She is persuading the family to change their vacation destination to Tennessee. â€Å"Here this fellow that calls himself The Misfit is aloose from the Federal Pen and headed toward the Florida and you read here what it says he did to these people. Just you read it. I wouldn’t take my children in any direction with a criminal like that aloose in it. I couldn’t answer to my conscience if I did† (O’Connor 345). She is trying to scare Bailey and also saying that going there could also be dangerous. She lies after she seems to not get any reaction from previous attempts by trying to say out that it’s not about her, but in fact it’s about the children. â€Å"The children have been to Florida before,† the old lady said. â€Å"You all ought to take them somewhere else for a change so they would see different parts of the world and be broad. They never have been to east Tennessee† (O’Connor 345). She is critical of the children’s mother and persuades Bailey by telling him that it can be an educational experience for his children. Truthfully, she wants to go to Tennessee for the benefit of her own only and fulfill her needs. One of major selfishness occurs when she first tries making her son Bailey change the whole vacation plans including the destination. She had always treated her son Bailey as if he was child still and expects him not to make his own decision for himself. After the family ignores the grandmother’s attempts of persuasion and her desire, they decide to go on their own way. She is urged to travel with her family. Subsequently the grandmother shows characteristics as if she were a follower. â€Å"The next morning the grandmother was the first one in the car, ready to go† (O’ Connor 345). At this moment in the story, her movement shows that she has been ignored and becomes the first one to get ready as if she has been forced to do so. In spite of knowing that her son Bailey doesn’t like taking cat onto their trips, she hides her cat, Pitty Sing, into the basket. †¦ and underneath it she was hiding a basket with Pitty Sing, the cat, in it† (O’Connor 345). She is avoiding her son and doesn’t want to leave the cat home alone. At the end of the story, the grandmother shows a very obvious selfishness act where is only concerned about her life only and shows zero concern about the rest of the family. When the family encounters the Misfit and his gang, the grandmother recognizes him as the Misfit. â€Å"I know you wouldn’t shoot a lady! I know you come from nice people! Pray! Jesus, you ought not to shoot a lady. I’ll give you all the money I’ve got! † (O’Connor 355). She is pleading the Misfit for her life only by saying the word lady repeatedly and offering him the money. She is also praising the Misfit by calling him a good man and trying to save her life. She was also careless about her family. When her family is taken down into the woods, she continues to talk to Misfit. She ignores the sound of when her son and rest of the family were being shot. She is apparently oblivious to many things. She was ignoring everything but the Misfit. â€Å"The shirt came flying at him and landed on his shoulders and he put it on. The grandmother couldn’t name what the shirt reminded her of† (O’Connor 354). The grandmother doesn’t even realize that shirt was her son Baileys. She had no interest in knowing where that shirt came from and what happened to my family. For the concern of her life only, she tries to persuade the Misfit the same way she tried with her family. â€Å"I know you’re a good man. You don’t look a bit like you have common blood. I know you must come from nice people! † (O’Connor 352). She is trying to manipulate the Misfit and hopes that he will bear her. She is thinking about no one else but the sake for herself. However she fails once again to influence the Misfit. One of her characteristics in the story is being a very pushy person. Even when she is not heard by her family, she continues to praise her homeland hoping that Bailey would change his mind still. After they had left The Tower, â€Å"a part-stucco and part-wood filling station and dance hall†¦ † (O’ Connor 348), the grandmother recapitulates â€Å"an old plantation that she had visited in this neighborhood once when was a young lady† (O’Connor 349). Regardless of the consequences, the grandmother finds an alternative way to manipulate Bailey for changing his route to the old house she wanted to see. She knew that Bailey would not be willing to lose anytime looking at an old house, but the more she talked about it, the more she wanted to see it once again† (O’Connor 349). She is being a very pushy person here trying to convince Bailey and makes it sound even interesting telling the children. â€Å"There was a secret panel in this house,â €  she said craftily, not telling the truth but wishing that she were, â€Å"and the story went that all family silver was hidden in it when Sherman came through but it was never found†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (O’Connor 349). The father concedes to visit the house after his kids start to yell and scream that they wanted to see the house with secret panels (350). She persuades the children about telling them a secret panel in the house which makes them grows their excitement even more in seeing it. However she is not telling the truth about the house but just making the children want to see it right away and would compel their father to take them there. She is not only being pushy to Bailey but also to the children. She seeks a way to gain Bailey’s attention. â€Å"It’s not far from here, I know,† the grandmother said. â€Å"It wouldn’t take over twenty minutes† (O’Connor 350). The grandmother later realizes that the house with secret panels she told the children is in Tennessee not in Georgia. Her desire to visit the old house from childhood results in an accident when her cat Pitty Sing sprang onto Bailey’s shoulder (350) losing the control of the car and resulting into an accident. If the grandmother had not pushed her son to detour to see the old house, which she later realized was in Tennessee not in Georgia, they wouldn’t have met with an accident. She is the cause of her entire family when they encounter the Misfit and his gang who shot everyone at the end of the story including the grandmother. Throughout the story, her various remarks reveal that she wants to achieve only for the benefit of her own and won’t let anything come in her way. At the end, during her conversation with the Misfit, the grandmother says that she knows him from good people trying to save her own life. She carried out herself as a very selfish person especially at the end of the story. In my opinion she remained a static character as her characteristics didn’t transform. She remains egocentric throughout the story and seeks to gain everything that will benefit her only. The grandmother shows various personality traits that brings families down fall at the end of the story. Her act of selfishness shows when she tells her son Bailey the benefit of taking their children to Tennessee. She wants the children to visit different part of world and be broad. But truthfully, only she will gain everything by going on vacation in Tennessee. She persuades her family by stating that this trip could be an educational experience for the children. As the story ends, she faces a death as her punishment for self-serving doings. Along with her, the entire family faces with death. Works Cited Updike, John. â€Å"Pygmalion. † Literature for Composition. 8th ed. New York: Pearson Longman, 2007. Print.

Chapter 1 the Investment Environment

Chapter 1 The Investment Environment 1. 1. Real Assets versus Financial Assets (Page 30) ? Real Assets ? Determine the productive capacity and net income of the economy ? Examples: Land, buildings, machines, and knowledge used to produce goods and services ? Financial Assets ? Claims on real assets 1-2 1. 2. Financial Assets (Page 32) ? Three types: 1. Fixed income or debt Common stock or equity Derivative securities 2. 3. 1-3 Fixed Income ? ? ? ? 1-4 Payments fixed or determined by a formula Money market debt: short term, highly marketable, sually low credit risk (T-bills, certificates of deposits etc) Capital market debt: long term bonds, can be safe or risky (Treasury bonds, municipal bonds, corporate bonds, etc) Bond ratings: in terms of default risk, from very safe to junk Common Stock and Derivatives ? Common Stock is equity or ownership in a corporation. ? ? Derivatives ? ? 1-5 Payments to stockholders are not fixed, but depend on the success of the firm Value derives from pri ces of other securities such as stocks and bonds Used to transfer risk (hedge) 1. 3.Financial Markets and the Economy (page 33-36) ? ? ? ? ? 1-6 Information Role: Capital flows to companies with best prospects Consumption Timing: Use securities to store wealth and transfer consumption to the future Allocation of Risk: Investors can select securities consistent with their tastes for risk Separation of Ownership and Management: minimize the famous agency costs and maximize firm value Corporate Governance and Corporate Ethics How to reduce the agency problems (Page 34-35) ? ? ? ? 1-7 Compensation plans: bonus, stock options, etc.The power of the board of directors Outsiders’ monitor Threat of takeover: proxy contest, mergers, etc. 1. 4. The Investment Process (page 36) ? When constructing a portfolio, investors need to decide: ? ? 1-8 Asset allocation ? Choice among broad asset classes Security selection ? Choice of which securities to hold within asset class ? Security analysis to value securities and determine investment attractiveness 1. 4. The Investment Process (page 37) ? 1-9 Portfolio strategies ? Top-down: starts from asset allocation Bottom-up: starts from individual securities 1. 5. Markets are Competitive (page 37-39) ? Implications from â€Å"no-free-lunch† proposition: ? ? Risk-Return Trade-Off Efficient Markets (security prices have reflected all information) (Chapter 11-12): ? Passive management ? No attempt to find undervalued securities ? No ? attempt to time the market ? Holding a highly diversified portfolio Active Management ? ? 1-10 Finding mispriced securities Timing the market 1. 6. The Players (page 39-42) ? ? ? ? Business Firms– net borrowersHouseholds – net savers Governments – can be both borrowers and savers Financial Intermediaries: Pool and invest funds ? Investment Companies ? Banks ? Insurance companies ? Credit unions 1-11 Universal Bank Activities Investment Banking †¢ Underwrite new stock and bond issues †¢ Sell newly issued securities to public in the primary market †¢ Investors trade previously issued securities among themselves in the secondary markets Commercial Banking †¢ Take deposits and make loans †¢ †¢ 1-12 1. 7. Financial Crisis of 2008 Reading (page 42-51) 1-13

Joan Didion, Essayist and Author Defined New Journalism

Joan Didion, Essayist and Author Defined New Journalism Joan Didion is a noted American writer whose essays helped define the New Journalism movement in the 1960s. Her sharply etched observations of American life in times of crisis and dislocation also played a role in her novels. When President Barack Obama presented Didion with the National Humanities Medal in 2012, the White House announcement cited her works of startling honesty and fierce intellect and noted she had illuminated the seemingly peripheral details that are central to our lives. Fast Facts: Joan Didion Born: December 5, 1934, Sacramento, California.Known For: Helped transform journalism in the 1960s with her sharply crafted essays that evoked America in crisis.Recommended Reading: Essay collections Slouching Toward Bethlehem and The White Album.Honors: Multiple honorary degrees and writing awards, including the National Humanities Medal awarded by President Barack Obama in 2012. In addition to her novels and literary journalism, she wrote a number of screenplays in collaboration with her husband, the journalist John Gregory Dunne. A documentary on her life by her nephew, actor Griffin Dunne, introduced her lifes work and its influence to the Netflix viewing audience in 2017. A critic interviewed in the documentary, Hilton Als of The New Yorker, said, â€Å"The weirdness of America somehow got into this person’s bones and came out on the other side of a typewriter.† Early Life Joan Didion was born December 5, 1934, in Sacramento, California. World War II broke out days after Didions seventh birthday, and when her father joined the military the family began moving about the country. Life on various military bases as a child first gave her the sense of being an outsider. After the war the family settled back in Sacramento, where Didion finished high school. She hoped to attend Stanford University but was rejected. After a period of disappointment and depression, she attended the University of California at Berkeley. During her college years she exhibited a strong interest in writing and entered a contest for student journalists sponsored by Vogue magazine. Didion won the contest, which secured her a temporary position at Vogue. She traveled to New York City to work at the magazine. Magazine Career Didions position at Vogue turned into a full-time job which lasted for eight years. She became an editor and a highly professional writer in the world of glossy magazines. She edited copy, wrote articles and movie reviews, and developed a set of skills which would serve her for the rest of her career. In the late 1950s she met John Gregory Dunne, a young journalist who had grown up in Hartford, Connecticut. The two became friends and eventually romantic as well as editorial partners. When Didion was writing her first novel, River Run, in the early 1960s, Dunne helped her edit it. The two married in 1964. The couple adopted a daughter, Quintana Roo Dunne, in 1966. Didion and Dunne moved from New York to Los Angeles in 1965, intent on making major career changes. According to some accounts, they intended to write for television, but at first they continued writing for magazines. Slouching Towards Bethlehem The Saturday Evening Post, a mainstream magazine remembered for its frequent cover paintings by Norman Rockwell, assigned Didion to report and write on cultural and social topics. She wrote a profile of John Wayne (whom she admired) and other pieces of fairly conventional journalism. As society seemed to change in startling ways, Didion, the daughter of conservative Republicans and herself a Goldwater voter in 1964, found herself observing the influx of hippies, Black Panthers, and the rise of the counterculture. By early 1967, she later recalled, she was finding it difficult to work. It felt to her like America was somehow coming apart and, as she put it, writing had become an irrelevant act. The solution, it seemed, was to go to San Francisco and spend time with the young people who were flooding into the city just before what would become legendary as The Summer of Love. The result of weeks of hanging about in the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood was perhaps her most famous magazine essay, Slouching Towards Bethlehem. The title was borrowed from The Second Coming, an ominous poem by the Irish poet William Butler Yeats. The article appears, on the surface, to have little or no structure. It opens with passages in which Didion evokes, with carefully chosen details, how in the cold late spring of 1967 America was in a time of bleak despair and adolescents drifted from city to torn city. Didion then described, with novelistic detail, the characters she spent time with, many of whom were taking drugs or seeking to acquire drugs or talking about their recent drug trips. The article departed from standard journalistic practice. At one point she did attempt to interview a policeman who had patrolled the neighborhood of the hippies, but he seemed to panic and stopped talking to her. She was accused of being a media poisoner by members of The Diggers, an anarchic group of hippies. So she hung out and listened, not interviewing anyone so much as just observing in the moment. Her observations were presented starkly as what was said and seen in her presence. It was up to the reader to draw deeper meaning. After the article was published in the Saturday Evening Post, Didion said many readers didnt grasp that she was writing about something more general than a handful of children wearing mandalas on their forehead. In the preface to a 1968 collection of her articles, itself titled Slouching Towards Bethlehem, she said she had never gotten feedback so universally beside the point. Didions technique, coupled with her distinct personality and mentions of her own anxiety, had created something of a template for later work. She continued writing journalistic essays for magazines. Over time she would become known for her observations of distinctly American events, ranging from the Manson murders to the increasingly bitter national politics of the late 1980s to the scandals of Bill Clinton. Joan Didion and husband John Gregory Dunne. Getty Images Novelist and Screenwiter In 1970 Didion published her second novel, Play It As It Lays, which was set in the world of Hollywood in which Didion and her husband had settled. (They collaborated on a screenplay for a 1972 film adaptation of the novel.) Didion continued to alternate writing fiction with her journalism, publishing three other novels: A Book of Common Prayer, Democracy, and The Last Thing He Wanted. Didion and Dunne collaborated on screenplays, including The Panic In Needle Park (produced in 1971) and the 1976 production of A Star Is Born, which starred Barbra Streisand. The work adapting a book about ill-fated anchorwoman Jessica Savitch turned into a Hollywood saga in which they wrote (and got paid for) numerous drafts before the film finally emerged as Up Close and Personal. John Gregorys Dunnes 1997 book Monster: Living Off the Big Screen detailed the peculiar story of endlessly rewriting the screenplay and dealing with Hollywood producers. Tragedies Didion and Dunne moved back to New York City in the 1990s. Their daughter Quintana became seriously ill in 2003, and after visiting her at the hospital, the couple returned to their apartment where Dunne suffered a fatal heart attack. Didion wrote a book about dealing with her grief, The Year of Magical Thinking, published in 2005. Tragedy struck again when Quintana, having recovered from a serious illness, fell at Los Angeles airport and suffered a serious brain injury. She seemed to be recovering her health but again became very ill and died in August 2005. Though her daughter died before the publication of The Year of Magical Thinking, she told The New York Times she hadnt considered changing the manuscript. She later wrote a second book about dealing with grief, Blue Nights, published in 2011. In 2017, Didion published a book of nonfiction, South and West: From a Notebook, an account of travels in the American South constructed from notes she had written decades earlier. Writing in The New York Times, critic Michiko Kakutani said what Didion wrote about travels in Alabama and Mississippi in 1970 was prescient, and seemed to point to much more modern divisions in American society. Sources: Joan Didion. Encyclopedia of World Biography, 2nd ed., vol. 20, Gale, 2004, pp. 113-116. Gale Virtual Reference Library.Doreski, C. K. Didion, Joan 1934- . American Writers, Supplement 4, edited by A Walton Litz and Molly Weigel, vol. 1, Charles Scribners Sons, 1996, pp. 195-216. Gale Virtual Reference Library.McKinley, Jesse. Joan Didions New Book Faces Tragedy. New York Times, 29 August 2005.