Tropic of Cancer, by Henry Miller
Published Originally in 1934
In scandal-ridden times like these, when CNN peddles presidential porn in the guise of news, it is difficult to see what made Tropic of Cancer such a controversial piece of literature.
However, at the time, nothing like it had ever been written. A novel that addressed issues of sex and social injustice so frankly was groundbreaking. The French, along with the rest of the world, weren't quite ready to admit faults of government or society, the seedy underbelly of the night and the soul.
Miller's novel depicts a man -- written in the first person, but incorporating the concept of "everyman" (as long as "everyman" existed in the dark corners of the city) -- trying to come to terms with his own feelings, however base and vulgar, however true and passionate. It is a novel that celebrates and reconciles the concept of the "true nature" of being.
One sentence in particular is the essence of Miller's inspiration: "Up to the present, my idea of collaborating with myself has been to get off the gold standard of literature. My idea briefly has been to present a resurrection of the emotions, to depict the conduct of a human being in the stratosphere of ideas, that is, the grip of deleruim." He wanted to throw off the mantle of 'literature' which deemed only certain experiences worthy of being told and published. He wanted literature to be for everyone, not just the scholars, not just the educated sitting in ivory towers. He wanted to make people think about the types of things they didn't normally think about, the types of things they didn't want to think about.
In times like these -- when we've all become numb to the horrific deeds that are performed around us in order to be able to live in a world that really can be so cruel at times -- Henry Miller makes us sit up and take notice. He gives us back our ability to be shocked and horrified at the ways humans can treat each other.
