Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller
"Tropic of Cancer," authored by Henry Miller, is a semi-autobiographical novel set in 1930s Paris, showcasing the life of an unnamed narrator navigating the struggles and joys of artistic existence amid financial hardship. Living at the Villa Borghese with a friend named Boris, the narrator reflects on his lack of material wealth while feeling an overwhelming sense of happiness and fulfillment as an artist. The narrative chronicles his search for love, friendship, lodging, and sustenance, all while he grapples with his identity and the nature of art itself.
As he wanders through the vibrant streets of Paris, he encounters a diverse cast of characters, including friends, lovers, and fellow expatriates, each enriching his experiences and insights. The book intertwines themes of nostalgia and the quest for community, as the narrator contemplates his past in America and his present life in France. His reflections reveal both the struggles of artistic creation and the allure of bohemian living, marked by a blend of desire, existential musings, and a search for belonging. Ultimately, "Tropic of Cancer" presents a raw and candid exploration of the artistic spirit and the complexities of human relationships, set against the backdrop of a culturally rich and historically resonant city.
Tropic of Cancer by Henry Miller
First published: 1934
Type of work: Novel
Type of plot: Psychological realism
Time of plot: Late 1930s
Locale: Paris
Principal Characters
Narrator ,Mona , his wife, who never appearsVan Norden , a friendCarl , another friend
The Story
The unnamed narrator, the “I” of the novel, is living at the Villa Borghese with his pal, Boris, during the fall of his second year in Paris. He has no money, no resources, no hopes, and yet is the happiest man alive. A year before he only thought he was an artist; now he is one. All literature has fallen from him, and the book he has written—and that the reader is reading—is not a book; it is a libel, a slander, a defamation of character. The book is a prolonged insult, a gob of spit in the face of Art, and a kick in the pants of God. The narrator promises to sing for his readers—a bit off-key perhaps, but sing nevertheless. The book will be that song.
The villa is about to be rented, and the narrator has to find new lodgings; he begins the narrative as he searches for another place to live in Paris and tries to survive without money. The story follows his wanderings in search of work, friendship, art, and love (both emotional and carnal) as well as lodging and food. The narrator also introduces the reader to an endless list of friends, including Tania, to whom he is singing in the novel; Borowski; Van Norden; the narrator’s wife, Mona, who never arrives from home; Boris; Moldorf, who is word-drunk; and finally Irene, who, like Tania, demands that he write fat letters to her. The narrator prowls around Paris, intoxicated by the streets, cafés, and squares—a compendium of Paris place-names and his dreams. Every day he returns to the American Express office on the Place du Opéra to see if he has received letters from home or money from Mona. He remembers his life back in the United States, and the cultural baggage of his past and the freedom he feels in the present merge in his mind and his art.
He concocts a scheme to get food by writing to various acquaintances to beg a meal once a week with each of them. He plans other scams as well. He writes to various women and begs money from them. He scrutinizes his love life and the sexual exploits of his friends. He gets a job proofreading for the Paris edition of an American newspaper published for expatriates and travelers. He works on his book, the book the reader is now reading. Mona writes that she is coming to join him in Paris, and he worries about how his wife will react to his bohemian style of living. Will her presence retard his writing, destroy his freedom to create? He sits in cafés day after day, talking endlessly of art and writing and life.
He meets Carl and Marlowe, neurasthenic American expatriates defeated by their life of exile. He discovers how stifling are the various households he visits. His sense of himself as an artist solidifies amid his wanderings among his friends. He is generous to all the disadvantaged persons he meets, offering them money when he has it, a room when one is available, and food even when he has little himself. Music enthralls him. People become the subject for his musings and the grist for his fiction. The nostalgia that dogs his memories of Mona interrupts his present pleasure with Tania. As time goes on, he becomes the artist/hero of his own creation.
In all of his peregrinations through the netherworld of Paris, he searches for a community, one that can sustain his needs as a man and as an artist. He is constantly frustrated but never disappointed. He travels from Paris to Dijon, a trip that is in itself unsuccessful, but he turns his effort into more material for his thoughts and for his work. At the end of the year, he witnesses the expatriate Fillmore’s return to America, and he realizes his own resilience and survival as an artist. Walking back from the railroad station with the cash Fillmore has left for Ginette sagging in his pockets, the narrator takes a cab to the Bois, past the Arc de Triomphe, to the Seine, where he gets out and starts walking toward the Port de Sèvres. Once again free from his entanglements, he realizes that he now has enough money to return to America. He has a vision of New York in the snow, and he wonders what has happened to his wife.
A great peace settles around him as he realizes that he does not want to return—not just yet, anyway. The lazy river, the soil so saturated by history that it cannot be detached from its human background, gives him a golden peace that produces in him the feeling of being on the top of a high mountain. He thinks about how strange humans are, so negligible at a distance and at the same time, close up, so ugly and malicious. They need to be surrounded by sufficient space, space more than time. The river flows through him, the hills gently girdle it about; its course is fixed.
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