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December book club: Tropic of Cancer

Discussion in 'Books' started by Not the Bees!, Nov 29, 2014.

  1. Not the Bees!

    Not the Bees!
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    I'm on my way to Sumatra for a couple weeks, so I'm going to call this one a day early. The December book is the phenomenonly dirty classic that is still shocking now :Tropic of Cancer.
     
  2. CharlesJohnson

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    Here is a pretty decent pdf: http://ebooksbeus.weebly.com/uploads/6/ ... miller.pdf

    It will be interesting to see how this discussion starts.

    The hype on this book was pretty intense. Let's see how much everyone agrees with that. It was banned in America from 1934 to 1961, when it was overturned by the Supreme Court. This was one of those landmark cases for free artistic speech, also one of those catalysts for the sexual revolution of the 60s. People were smuggling and counterfeiting this work for 30 years. Some booksellers went to jail for it.

    If anyone wishes to read a little more background: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropic_of_ ... 28novel%29
     
  3. Crown Royal

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    Let us also not forget this book has an exceptionally good prequel: Tropic of Capricorn.

    It was also a movie starring Rip Torn as Henry Miller. You drink every time somebody says "cunt" onscreen.

    Miller certainly is an author who took full advantage of the rockstar celebrity writers used to have. This guy had pretty much his own sex cult of beautiful women and he was NOT a handsome or kind man.
     
  4. Kampf Trinker

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    Since this book is highly regarded and I'm guessing most of you like it I suppose I'm going to be the contrarian here. I bought this book yesterday, and since it's short I finished it this morning. I didn't care for this book at all. It's just the ramblings of some loser who wanders around Paris from shitty hotel room to shitty apartment and from whore to whore. I didn't see any point to the story at all. I didn't give a flying fuck about any of the characters. None of them were interesting, and the protagonist was least interesting of all.

    I haven't been this bored by a 'classic' since I read Moby Dick, but at least for that the story itself was quite good, it just got bogged down by indulgent descriptions of whaling tools and 19th century science. The excessive descriptions and senseless philosophical meanderings in the book did nothing for me. The prose is pretty, I suppose, but that matters little to me when it's just mindless drivel. I didn't find his long and winding beliefs either insightful or interesting. Mostly I just thought, 'what the fuck are you on about?'

    I understand this is a landmark book in terms of freedom of speech and freedom of artistry. I don't think that makes it good. I think a lot of the appeal of the book had to do with the taboo subject matter at the time it was written. If someone published this crap in the modern era I don't think anyone would care.

    I don't necessarily need a plot, but if you aren't going to give me that give me a story, and if not that at least give me some humor- something. This book had nothing to offer. The last 80 pages in particular were a chore to get through. The story, if you can call it that, gets halted so Miller can ramble about the universe and his superfluous thoughts about the civilization around him. It was boring beyond boring and insipid.

    So that's my scathing review. I really hated this book. It's one of the least interesting novels I've ever read. I realize this will seem over the top to a lot of you reading this, but you can't please everybody and all that. Based on what I've seen it's somewhat of a polarizing book. I just can't see how this could possibly be considered one of the best novels of the 20th century.
     
  5. Crown Royal

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    I feel that way about Great Gatsby, even being fully aware it's a classic. Everyone finds boredom in critically acclaimed things, especially if they're contemporary.
     
  6. CharlesJohnson

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    I find it hilarious that you enjoyed Women by Bukowski, but hated this. I don't even know what to say to that because I consider this the same book, but executed way better. Bukowski claims himself to be a writer,attempting to be a sage, but he's an inarticulate, lazy, drunk that can't get out of his own way. Miller made his own philosophy.

    Chalk me up as one that loathed Gatsby too. Don't get it. There was a halfway good story in there, old sport.
     
  7. audreymonroe

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    The most powerful cervix... in the world...

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    I don't know, man. I wanted to like this book. In the past 6 months, 3 or 4 people have told me that it's either their favorite book or that it should be the next book that I read. The setting, both time and place, is one of my favorite settings. I like stories about writers. I was intrigued by the notoriety. And I usually like this kind of voice. It reminds me of On the Road, which I know a lot of people don't like for what are shaping up to be the same reasons I don't think I like this.

    I'm 112 pages into the pdf, and I don't know what that translates to in actual pages but I think it's been about 5 chapters now and...I don't know what the point of this book is? I couldn't tell you anything that's happened. I couldn't tell you anything I think may be happening. I couldn't tell you anything about any other characters. I couldn't even really tell you anything about the main character. I just...feel like I'm the sober friend listening to a guy on coke ramble about something. I don't need something to be super plot-driven, but at least with On the Road there were these little mini-quests that you could follow. Each scene was a little story and had a little point even if the overall plot was barely existent. But I need SOMETHING to happen. And with that, at least when I started feeling my attention waver there were enough passages where the writing was beautiful enough to make me stop and admire it and get excited about it again. But there really hasn't been anything with this yet where I've thought "Wow, what a lovely sentence."

    I also hate how he writes about women (and since this is mostly autobiographical how he, therefore, thinks about women) and, while it's less upsetting given when it was written, there's just so much casual anti-Semitism. If this was purely fiction I'd think "hey, it's just an unlikable character," but for what it is it's just not making me want to continue reading his thoughts. And what I remember most about what I've read so far is just how fucking much time he dedicates to talking about lice and bedbugs. I just have been feeling gross while reading this.

    Since there's the pdf and it's an easy, quick read I don't think I'm going to give up on it yet. Maybe keep reading it at work when it's slow or something. But I'm not really feeling it so far.
     
  8. Kampf Trinker

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    I didn't think Women was a masterpiece and it eventually started to wear me down, but there were two big differences for me. Women was funny, and Bukowski's outlooks were entertaining and didn't go on too long. Mostly they're a page or two and then he's back to one of his dysfunctional relationships. At one point Miller goes off for 40+ pages and it was just too much. While those two chapters were exceptionally rambling, they weren't really an exception.

    As far as making prose flow well and high quality writing in a more serious literary sense this was a way better book. It's just I have to care about what the author is saying, or see a little more coherency and I really didn't. There's obviously plenty there for the right reader, but it just wasn't for me.
     
  9. The Village Idiot

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    I actually voted for this book because I hated it back in high school. Sometimes I like to revisit things because maybe I didn't understand it the first time around, or maybe my tastes have changed.

    So far, about 70 pages in, the 16 year old version of my self had it right. While I enjoy the writing itself, the book, and 'story,' is just incoherent babbling - very similar in certain respects to Joyce's 'The Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man' which I also hated.
     
  10. Juice

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    Miller is Bukowski if he took quaaludes and had deeper introspection. Some parts I didnt give a shit about, namely him describing his writing style and method. And I think I liked Bukowskis blue-collar depravity more than the pre-war Bohemianism of Miller, but I do like the cut of Miller's jib. I liked it way more this time around compared to when I read it a few years ago.
     
  11. guernica

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    I only got 10 or so pages in before I had to stop. Just felt to similar to Bukowski's book in terms of the theme, and I struggled for the last quarter of that book as it had become too repetitive.
     
  12. Crown Royal

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    Comparing this to Women is fitting since they are both self-narrated writer tales of rudderless vice. My opinion: Miller is by far the better writer, Bukowski the better story teller. Miller is obviously one-of-a-kind. You can see how his writing in this novel is a touchstone for the Beat culture, however sometimes he goes off on such wild and kooky tangents I felt like I was being sucked into some higher state of consciousness then 25 pages later I find out that "Jesus, he hasn't even left the fucking ROOM? I want to loot through this man's medicine cabinet SO bad."

    Miller is gifted as a writer like very few are. His style is his own, but this story veers off on thought so much it becomes dream-like and the story itself becomes confusing and at times difficult to map out. With Women I NEVER had trouble knowing what was going on thanks to the meat-and-potatoes approach.

    With "Women" a lot of us would read it and think "You know what? I could probably write something like this." -- that is not the case with Tropic Of Cancer.
     
  13. CharlesJohnson

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    "I made up my mind that I would hold on to nothing, that I would expect nothing, that henceforth I would live as an animal, a beast of prey, a rover, a plunderer. even if war were declared, and i were my lot to go, I would grab the bayonet and plunge it, plunge it up to the hilt. And if rape were the order of the day then rape I would, and with a vengeance... One must burrow into life again in order to put on flesh; the soul thirsts. On whatever crumb my eye fastens, I will pounce and devour. If to live is the paramount thing, then I will live, even if I must become a cannibal. Heretofore I have been trying to save my hide, trying to preserve the few pieces of meat that hid my bones. I am done with that. I have reached the limits of endurance. My back is to the wall; I can retreat no further. as far as history goes I am dead. If there is something beyond I shall have to bounce back. I have found God, but he is insufficient. I am only spiritually dead. Physically I am alive. Morally I am free. The world which I have departed is a menagerie. The dawn is breaking on a new world, a jungle world in which the lean spirits roam with sharp claws. If I am a hyena I am a lean and hungry one: I go forth to fatten myself."

    This selection made me feel more alive than anything before. It's partly the reason I suggested the book in the first place. When I first read this book, and twice since then, it was a shot in the arm. For a young man Miller was a firebrand, an exceptionally intelligent monster, who could maneuver through life and sex. It was inspirational. I grew up with negative male influence. Nobody taught me how to be. Same reason that people latched onto Tucker Max. Not that either of these men are meant to be emulated. Now that I've grown, the more unsavory aspects of Miller are even more apparent. But Miller had a spark of passion that I responded to. This was a man who knew himself completely. I'm still envious of his talent and voice.
     
  14. LatinGroove

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    This book is such garbage.
    I have never met a man more full of himself than Henry Miller in this book. He reminds me of the hipster at Starbucks with his Macbook, full of ennui and fancy words. This book was written in a time when the words contained were considered uncouth and profane. If it were written today, I would have never heard of it. Yet for a man who is so well known and writes so fancy, he says so little throughout the entire book.

    Given the above, I usually pride myself in my ability to plow through a book even if I hate it, just to say I gave it a chance. I have been reading this book for over a month already and dreaded every time I picked it up. I'm finally giving up on reading it 169 pages in because it is such a piece of shit. A lot of folks compared this book to Bukowski's Women but I find the latter to be without question a superior book. Not only was Bukowski entertaining and hilarious but there was a semblance of a story interspersed with tidbits of wisdom. Not so with this book. To me this read more as a stream of consciousness with the words "cunt" and "whore" mixed in rather than legitimate literature. The only time I found myself laughing was when the Indian guy was talking about pulling a harmonica out of a woman's vagina.

    0 of 5 stars.