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The Santa Ana Wind In Joan Didion's Los Angeles Notebook

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Joan Didion views the Santa Ana winds as malevolent entities, both powerfully frightening and mysteriously dangerous in her essay, "Los Angeles Notebook." The wind is believed to change the people that it touches, causing people to behave in most uncharacteristic manners. While science proves that the ratio of positive to negative ions is significantly higher before the wind blows, it doesn 't explain why people are so drastically affected. Through Didion 's use of diction in word choices like "eerie", "ominously", "malevolent", and "surreal", a tone of suspenseful tension is conveyed as the people await the Santa Ana Winds -- and the tone serves the purpose of portraying Didion 's opinion that the winds are "sinister" and "mechanistic" and something to be avoided. Similarly, the method that Didion uses to string along her sentences conveys the tone as well - the excerpt is filled with a plethora of loosely constructed sentences which serve to layer on the detail and build the suspense. The diction throughout "Los Angeles Notebook" functions as a way in which Didion utilizes in order to convey her opinion on the Santa Ana Wind, which is unexplainable as to their effects on people and are entirely sinister entities. Word choices throughout the excerpt such as "uneasy", "screaming", "frets", and "sulks" all portray the responses that people make to these winds. Selections like "foehn" and "khamsin", "friction" and "solar disturbances" allow the audience to acknowledge that
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