I read this book several years ago. I wasn't then in a position to fully grasp the lietarary value of it, plus I lost the book!. Now I want to read it again and safekeep it.

Read as much about the story behind this book as possible before reading the book itself.

In a sense, it is nothing more than a diary of a man in Paris during the "great" Depression who was passionate about writing, so passionate he simply walked away from a mundane job one day, managed to get to Paris on ten dollars, and lived by his wits, if starving is living. Had it not been for Anaïs Nin's encouragement and her (husband's) financial generosity, it is doubtful Henry Miller's writing would have seen the light of day.

Read Volume One (1931 - 1934) of the Anaïs Nin diaries and her novel "Henry and June" before reading "Tropic of Cancer."

The particular edition of "Tropic of Cancer" I have is the 1961 Grover Press edition with an introduction of the author by Karl Shapiro (an essay that first appeared in "Two Cities," Paris, France). The edition also includes the 1934 preface by Anaïs Nin that should be found in all editions. It's hard to believe this is THE edition that was banned in the United States and led to obscenity trials. I wish it had the dust jacket or Miller's autograph!

[The 1930's -- when "Tropic of Cancer" was written -- represented the last great era for writing, just before WWII, and the explosion of television, and now blogging. One of Henry Miller's vignettes in "Tropic" reveals how important reading was to the French: Miller's American writer friend would have likely been incarcerated for statutory rape had the father not seen copies of Goethe's "Faust," Shakespeare's plays, and other literature in the apartment and taken Miller's friend to be serious and perhaps important.

"Tropic of Cancer" is a tough book to read, but it paints a picture of the starving lifestyle of artists passionate in their beliefs that they had something to offer.]

After its publication in 1934, why was this book banned as obscene for 27 years? One big reason is probably the way Miller refers to women, often using the c-word.

Set in the 1930's, Paris, Tropic of Cancer describes how an expatriate artist (Miller) survives by taking advantage of patrons and their money, writing and, of course, getting laid.

It's plotless and definitely atypical.

I'm hoping Oprah will make this her next Book Club selection - if she thinks Dr. Eckhart Tolle's A New Earth is revivifying amid the sterility of modern life, she hasn't seen anything yet. Tropic of Cancer is nothing less than a bilgistic piece of ecstatic optimism. It comes as an electric shock when read in the context of the last century's deadening, pessimistic literature or in the context of our (generally) syrupy, self-conscious contemporary literature - or just in the context of day to day life as it has come to be practiced. And while most of the book seems satisfied with getting some mischievous laughs at the expense of Modern Civilization, the last 100 pages or so sustain a level of intensity that can stand beside anything written in English.

Puerile, vulgar, and tawdry.

Apt description of Henry Miller, American expatriate and author of "Tropic of Cancer," a semi-autobiographical novel of his time in Paris, pathetic in its hedonism, rich in its misanthropy, and ultimately anarchic. Miller makes no attempts to portray his novel as a redeeming salvo; he revels in his own literary filth amid his self-described truth and ugliness. And for this, the novel was banned in the United States after it was published in the 1930s. Banned, for its obscenity.

Banned, for its vulgarity. Banned, for its depravity.

But is "Tropic of Cancer" an exercise in literary putrefaction? Is Henry Miller a purveyor of repulsiveness?

Upon my first reading at the age of eighteen, "Tropic of Cancer" spoke to me of the truth inherent in human nature, all of the maliciousness, greed, hate, and grotesqueness that humans face every day and attempt to rectify in the name of the common good. And the novel did not hide these facets of human nature. Rather, Miller brought them to the forefront and wallowed in them, I felt, to reveal these truths to a public that refused to acknowledge their existence. Even when its existence was present every day. The novel read like an unspoken truth, and I clung to every word seeking that truth for myself.

But I did not need to search for it.

Miller made this truth accessible for all.

And had I found it? What would I have done with that knowledge? Would I lose my humanity like Miller had done?

"Tropic of Cancer" is as close to depravity's surface as I will ever get.

Or allow myself to.