(05-09-2020 01:26 PM)The Grape King Wrote:  In the last few weeks I've read Wait Until Spring, Bandini; A Moveable Feast by Hemingway and am about to finish Tropic of Capricorn by Henry Miller. Deciding in which order to read Mystery by Knut Hamsun and Under the Volcano by Malcom Lowry next.

Definitely wouldn't recommend Tropic of Capricorn. Of the 350 pages, probably 50-75 are worth reading, fictionalized scenes of Miller's life in pre Depression Brooklyn. The rest is full of misogyny, racist diatribes, and meandering and self-indulgent bits of middle school existentialism. The prose drifts between good and excellent, but it's not quite enough to redeem it or make me want to sit through any more of his work.

I read Miller's The Colossus of Maroussi a few years ago. I hated it...awful rambling mess. Thy guy hated the US and it came out in the book.

I had a friend/coworker that read for hours each day and read some odd stuff. He loaned me The Colossus of Maroussi and Barbarians at the Gate at the same time. Hated the first and loved the second.

Galvanized: The Odyssey of a Reluctant Carolina Confederate

GREAT book that shines an unbiased light on a somewhat reluctant participant in the Civil War.

Written by a friend of mine, and someone who I had several writing workshops with during graduate school at ECU. After getting our MA's together, Mike went on to get his MFA, and is now a professor at Barton College.

He found out (while researching for a project at ECU) that his great, great grandfather was a Confederate solider during the Civil War.

He fought for BOTH the Union & Confederacy, almost died during Pickett's Charge, was at Appomattox,... deserted, and walked from Wisconsin to North Carolina. This is his story.



Direct Author Site
Amazon link to book

(05-11-2020 10:25 AM)GrayBeard Wrote:  

(05-09-2020 01:26 PM)The Grape King Wrote:  In the last few weeks I've read Wait Until Spring, Bandini; A Moveable Feast by Hemingway and am about to finish Tropic of Capricorn by Henry Miller. Deciding in which order to read Mystery by Knut Hamsun and Under the Volcano by Malcom Lowry next.

Definitely wouldn't recommend Tropic of Capricorn. Of the 350 pages, probably 50-75 are worth reading, fictionalized scenes of Miller's life in pre Depression Brooklyn. The rest is full of misogyny, racist diatribes, and meandering and self-indulgent bits of middle school existentialism. The prose drifts between good and excellent, but it's not quite enough to redeem it or make me want to sit through any more of his work.

I read Miller's The Colossus of Maroussi a few years ago. I hated it...awful rambling mess. Thy guy hated the US and it came out in the book.

I had a friend/coworker that read for hours each day and read some odd stuff. He loaned me The Colossus of Maroussi and Barbarians at the Gate at the same time. Hated the first and loved the second.

Yea he was hot and cold on the US. Had an angsty phase and ran off to Paris to write the Tropics, ended up spending the last few decades of his life in Big Sur and somewhere else on the Paciifc coast.

Every time an American runs off to Paris to write, they write garbage. Seems to work for the other Europeans did the same thing (my two all-time favorite novels, Journey to the End of the Night and Molloy were both written in Paris), but the Americans that stayed home produced much more authentic stuff.

i initially complained about the vulgarity of henry miller. i've said this somewhere before but he is to woman what hunter thompson is to drugs. yeah, but hell of a writer and what kind of person writes what he writes? i flew thru his books even though i said i felt like i had to wash my hands after. who bares their soul and casts themselves as anti-hero, innocently? imo, capricorn was far tamer than cancer. tnx for the recommends grapes

(05-14-2020 09:49 PM)Lush Wrote:  i initially complained about the vulgarity of henry miller. i've said this somewhere before but he is to woman what hunter thompson is to drugs. yeah, but hell of a writer and what kind of person writes what he writes? i flew thru his books even though i said i felt like i had to wash my hands after. who bares their soul and casts themselves as anti-hero, innocently? imo, capricorn was far tamer than cancer. tnx for the recommends grapes

Personally as someone that mostly reads literary realism, I find it almost strange when writers don't write about the vulgar, if even just a little bit. Real life is vulgar and it's hard to accurately portray the human experience without its sordid details. When it's done gratuitously, it can come off as chasing shock value more than honesty. Bukowski does a lot of things really well, but I get tired of his work for that reason. Do I need to read his disgusting tales of horrible sex over and over from his first book through his last? No.

When it comes to Hunter S., I think Fear and Loathing is a masterpiece disguised as pulpy humor. I'm not big on his whole gun toting Americana brand, but that book is fantastic. The Rum Diary was good, too. Movie sucked.