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3.56 AVERAGE
3.56 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
reflective
medium-paced
I picked up Tropic of Capricorn a little under two months ago, along with Lady Chatterley's Lover. Looking back, I had high hopes for this novel going in. From its in-your-face, frank cover (yes, one of the reasons I was excited about the book was because of its cover, sue me), the promise of sexual content so explicit that it was banned in America, and the general hyping of the book by the back cover, I was sure I was in for a literary treat.
What I ended up getting was one of the worst novels I have ever read.
Left to my own devices, this review will devolve into a frustrated, incoherent rant. With this in mind, I'll try to temper myself to make this more cohesive and less charged. I apologize in advance if I fail.
My main gripe with the novel can be summarized in two simple (possibly even childish) words: it's boring. Reading the story was eventually like pulling teeth, and a reading novel shouldn't be that way. I should find it hard to stop reading, not finding myself having to force -myself words. Reading this story was a painful slog and I shamefully admit that towards the end, I found myself skimming over portions of the text.
To give props where props are due, the sexual content is as explicit as it gets. The sexual portions as a result read the smoothest as well. I hate to once again seem like a hapless pervert, but as The Nation stated, "The greatest passages [of Tropic of Capricorn] are the scenes of lovemaking." There isn't much to say, they're numerous, steamy, and most importantly, interesting to read. Miller's frank tales of his sexual exploits are what got this books taken off shelves, and they deliver.
However, these scenes. as good as they may be, are decidedly not enough to carry this novel. When we aren't given sex scenes, we are usually given an ocean of pretentious garbage that is hard to follow. This ocean is boring at best, and gag-inducing at worst. If this only comprised a small portion of the novel, I wouldn't mind, but this makes up most of the novel, and I really feel that it bogs it down.
It isn't just the sex that makes the sexual scenes good. It's also the presence of plot: a direction, a goal, a logical order of events. The novel is fine when there is plot. These include Miller's exploits at his job (found primarily at the beginning of the novel), his recollections of his childhood, and stories about his "friends". While I wouldn't say the novel "shines" during these sections, at least it briefly isn't a black hole that sucks away all entertainment.
The rest of the book is dedicated to Miller's boring, pretentious musings that quickly become quite trite. Some musings would be fine, this this book is like oversteeped tea. It had potential, you can vaguely taste what the package said it was, yet you let it bask so much in its own juices that it's self-indulgent, watery, and gross. Now, take that failed beverage and chug it until it's gone and you're uncomfortably full. That's my experience with this book.
If that wasn't bad enough, the protagonist rubbed me in all the wrong ways. Keep in mind that this is an autobiography, so Henry Miller didn't make a pitiful person, for he is said person. From the top of my head Miller is a misogynistic, racist, ungrateful, whiny, self-absorbed, entitled, vain, irresponsible, adulterer and rapist among many other unsavory things. This naturally leeks into some of his pretentious tirades. He apparently hates everything, including his city, country, and humanity itself. But (of course), Miller has also mastered the "Secret Politician Style Flip-Flop" where he insults African-Americans throughout the book yet calls them "beautiful" near the end to cash in on some "nice points". When the book isn't boring, it's just plain offensive.
And I apologize if me not "getting" or appreciating the book means that I'm an immature reader and I lack the skills to read books for literary merit. This is my free time, and I want to be entertained, not assaulted by pseudo-intellectual garbage.
I originally panned to end this review somewhat lightheartedly. I would express my dissatisfaction with the novel then state jokingly that I would go through it all again when reading the sequel (sort of), Tropic of Cancer. That was about a month ago, and now I'm not sure if I can bring myself to try Tropic of Cancer. I had no idea just how much I'd grow to loathe Capricorn, and from what I've gathered, Cancer suffers from the same problems as Capricorn. I might give it a try if someone informs me that the two novels are radically different. Given my desire to actually meet my reading goal this year, and given the fact that I don't like reading to be a slog, I do not see myself reading Tropic of Cancer anytime soon.
Even though I know for certain that there are those who enjoy this novel, due to my own dismal experience with it, I cannot in good faith recommend Henry Miller's Tropic of Capricorn to anyone.
What I ended up getting was one of the worst novels I have ever read.
Left to my own devices, this review will devolve into a frustrated, incoherent rant. With this in mind, I'll try to temper myself to make this more cohesive and less charged. I apologize in advance if I fail.
My main gripe with the novel can be summarized in two simple (possibly even childish) words: it's boring. Reading the story was eventually like pulling teeth, and a reading novel shouldn't be that way. I should find it hard to stop reading, not finding myself having to force -myself words. Reading this story was a painful slog and I shamefully admit that towards the end, I found myself skimming over portions of the text.
To give props where props are due, the sexual content is as explicit as it gets. The sexual portions as a result read the smoothest as well. I hate to once again seem like a hapless pervert, but as The Nation stated, "The greatest passages [of Tropic of Capricorn] are the scenes of lovemaking." There isn't much to say, they're numerous, steamy, and most importantly, interesting to read. Miller's frank tales of his sexual exploits are what got this books taken off shelves, and they deliver.
However, these scenes. as good as they may be, are decidedly not enough to carry this novel. When we aren't given sex scenes, we are usually given an ocean of pretentious garbage that is hard to follow. This ocean is boring at best, and gag-inducing at worst. If this only comprised a small portion of the novel, I wouldn't mind, but this makes up most of the novel, and I really feel that it bogs it down.
It isn't just the sex that makes the sexual scenes good. It's also the presence of plot: a direction, a goal, a logical order of events. The novel is fine when there is plot. These include Miller's exploits at his job (found primarily at the beginning of the novel), his recollections of his childhood, and stories about his "friends". While I wouldn't say the novel "shines" during these sections, at least it briefly isn't a black hole that sucks away all entertainment.
The rest of the book is dedicated to Miller's boring, pretentious musings that quickly become quite trite. Some musings would be fine, this this book is like oversteeped tea. It had potential, you can vaguely taste what the package said it was, yet you let it bask so much in its own juices that it's self-indulgent, watery, and gross. Now, take that failed beverage and chug it until it's gone and you're uncomfortably full. That's my experience with this book.
If that wasn't bad enough, the protagonist rubbed me in all the wrong ways. Keep in mind that this is an autobiography, so Henry Miller didn't make a pitiful person, for he is said person. From the top of my head Miller is a misogynistic, racist, ungrateful, whiny, self-absorbed, entitled, vain, irresponsible, adulterer and rapist among many other unsavory things. This naturally leeks into some of his pretentious tirades. He apparently hates everything, including his city, country, and humanity itself. But (of course), Miller has also mastered the "Secret Politician Style Flip-Flop" where he insults African-Americans throughout the book yet calls them "beautiful" near the end to cash in on some "nice points". When the book isn't boring, it's just plain offensive.
And I apologize if me not "getting" or appreciating the book means that I'm an immature reader and I lack the skills to read books for literary merit. This is my free time, and I want to be entertained, not assaulted by pseudo-intellectual garbage.
I originally panned to end this review somewhat lightheartedly. I would express my dissatisfaction with the novel then state jokingly that I would go through it all again when reading the sequel (sort of), Tropic of Cancer. That was about a month ago, and now I'm not sure if I can bring myself to try Tropic of Cancer. I had no idea just how much I'd grow to loathe Capricorn, and from what I've gathered, Cancer suffers from the same problems as Capricorn. I might give it a try if someone informs me that the two novels are radically different. Given my desire to actually meet my reading goal this year, and given the fact that I don't like reading to be a slog, I do not see myself reading Tropic of Cancer anytime soon.
Even though I know for certain that there are those who enjoy this novel, due to my own dismal experience with it, I cannot in good faith recommend Henry Miller's Tropic of Capricorn to anyone.
1 / 4 : If interested, read
[1920s New York gives Henry Miller his first taste of c**t]
Reflective of its American setting, Tropic of Capricorn is a violent, sexual work. It cleaves through our nation's gilded veneer. Death and distress dominate as an adolescent Henry Miller leans in to his off-kilter destiny.
Reaches new levels of c-word usage.
I listened to a narration by Campbell Scott
[1920s New York gives Henry Miller his first taste of c**t]
Reflective of its American setting, Tropic of Capricorn is a violent, sexual work. It cleaves through our nation's gilded veneer. Death and distress dominate as an adolescent Henry Miller leans in to his off-kilter destiny.
Reaches new levels of c-word usage.
I listened to a narration by Campbell Scott
adventurous
challenging
dark
funny
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
N/A
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Always 5 stars for Henry Valentine Miller, the only author to have ever existed
challenging
dark
funny
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
In Tropic of Capricorn, Henry Miller appears in a hallucinated monologue of a type on the fringes, of an outsider, a magnificent loser, rebellious, flayed alive, of a saturnal personality (O Verlaine!).
Miller retraces the life of his Brooklyn neighborhood as he first knew it as a child: his memories of his grandfather's little tailor shop and the smells of the businesses in his community - the Mephistopheles infection of tanner's skin with the irresistible scent of fresh bread and confectionery pastries. He thus becomes the saddened and revolted witness of the metamorphosis of this once so-familiar setting. Miller reveals himself, on the other hand, as a womanizer, sometimes violent with women, always broke but just as lavish, regularly "tapper" (one would say a scratcher nowadays ...), calculating and, above all, odiously cynical (or fiercely honest it depends ...). But he knows how to be tender, with a sad tenderness reminiscent of the forever bygone days of mischievous, naive, and generous youth. Or when it paints a portrait of his father, jovial and bon vivant, of a healthy anticlericalism. Who, diminished and weakened by illness, seized with remorse of conscience, becomes a late devotee, "elder of his congregation," To finally be extinguished in the emptiness left by the departure of his beloved pastor. The author also recounts his beginnings in a writer's career, the enthusiastic discovery of the Dada movement and surrealism from which he was, spiritually, apart across the Atlantic while ignoring. It seems, its existence. He professes his great admiration for Dostoyevsky and Elie Faure (author of monumental art history) and recounts Bergson's revelation by reading Creative Evolution.
We have spoken of the writer as lively-skinned, and this opus reflects this temperament. Miller belches in well-timed prose all his hatred (his wounded love? His modesty?), All his rage, his anger, destroyed the American dream. He pushes his diatribe against human stupidity, the ugliness of an absurd and frenzied American society, taken by an itch of movement so as not to have to think, cannibal, plagued by violence. His prose is a ferment of madness, an apology for dreams in reaction against a civilization unsurprisingly omnipresent with a harmful obsession for perfection.
It is impossible to ignore the main inconvenience of this work.
Sometimes, the text gets bogged down in delusions of surrealist descriptions, rantings (one of his favorite words), meaningless, and confusing; it becomes boring, almost illegible, and defies the limits of patience and goodwill. Several times, the book nearly fell out of my hands. And then, fiercely for the feminist cause, go your way or suffer the ulcer that will appear when reading the detailed and complacent accounts of the multiple exploits and sexual performances of a sacred hot rabbit.
Miller retraces the life of his Brooklyn neighborhood as he first knew it as a child: his memories of his grandfather's little tailor shop and the smells of the businesses in his community - the Mephistopheles infection of tanner's skin with the irresistible scent of fresh bread and confectionery pastries. He thus becomes the saddened and revolted witness of the metamorphosis of this once so-familiar setting. Miller reveals himself, on the other hand, as a womanizer, sometimes violent with women, always broke but just as lavish, regularly "tapper" (one would say a scratcher nowadays ...), calculating and, above all, odiously cynical (or fiercely honest it depends ...). But he knows how to be tender, with a sad tenderness reminiscent of the forever bygone days of mischievous, naive, and generous youth. Or when it paints a portrait of his father, jovial and bon vivant, of a healthy anticlericalism. Who, diminished and weakened by illness, seized with remorse of conscience, becomes a late devotee, "elder of his congregation," To finally be extinguished in the emptiness left by the departure of his beloved pastor. The author also recounts his beginnings in a writer's career, the enthusiastic discovery of the Dada movement and surrealism from which he was, spiritually, apart across the Atlantic while ignoring. It seems, its existence. He professes his great admiration for Dostoyevsky and Elie Faure (author of monumental art history) and recounts Bergson's revelation by reading Creative Evolution.
We have spoken of the writer as lively-skinned, and this opus reflects this temperament. Miller belches in well-timed prose all his hatred (his wounded love? His modesty?), All his rage, his anger, destroyed the American dream. He pushes his diatribe against human stupidity, the ugliness of an absurd and frenzied American society, taken by an itch of movement so as not to have to think, cannibal, plagued by violence. His prose is a ferment of madness, an apology for dreams in reaction against a civilization unsurprisingly omnipresent with a harmful obsession for perfection.
It is impossible to ignore the main inconvenience of this work.
Sometimes, the text gets bogged down in delusions of surrealist descriptions, rantings (one of his favorite words), meaningless, and confusing; it becomes boring, almost illegible, and defies the limits of patience and goodwill. Several times, the book nearly fell out of my hands. And then, fiercely for the feminist cause, go your way or suffer the ulcer that will appear when reading the detailed and complacent accounts of the multiple exploits and sexual performances of a sacred hot rabbit.
adventurous
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
challenging
dark
mysterious
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
lovely, rambling, awful, gross, fantastic, offensive, ranting, raving, and really beautiful. Takes you everywhere and nowhere. Read it!
Tropic of Capricorn has without a doubt the best opening out of any book I have ever read. Before anything even happens, you already understand the writer and why the book exists. If you do not want to read this book, fine. At least read the first few pages. It is truly worth your while. In truth though, Tropic of Capricorn is not a book. It is something entirely else that should have its own category. Just bear this in mind before reading it.
These are some of the shorter sections that I believe represent the spirit of this masterpiece:
“I remember distinctly how when my mother arrived on a visit she seemed peeved that I was so contented with my new life. She even remarked that I was ungrateful, a remark I never forgot, because then I realized for the first time that to be ungrateful was perhaps necessary and good for one.”
“It was a personal tour in the impersonal world, a man with a tiny trowel in his hand digging a tunnel through the earth to get to the other side. The idea was to tunnel through and find at last the Culebra Cut, the nec plus ultra, of the honeymoon of flesh. And of course there was no end to the digging. The best I might hope for was to get stuck in the dead centre of the earth, where the pressure was strongest and most even all around, and stay stuck there forever. That would give me the feeling of Ixion on the wheel, which is one sort of salvation and not entirely to be sneezed at. On the other hand I was a metaphysician of the instinctivist sort; it was impossible for me to stay stuck anywhere, even in the dead center of the earth. It was most imperative to find and enjoy the metaphysical fuck, and for that I would be obliged to come out on to a wholly new tableland, a mesa of sweet alfalfa and polished monoliths, where the eagles and the vultures flew at random.”
“What is unmentionable is pure fuck and pure cunt; it must be mentioned only in de luxe editions, otherwise the world will fall apart What holds the world together, as I have learned from bitter experience, is sexual intercourse. But fuck, the real thing, cunt, the real thing, seems to contain some unidentified element which is far more dangerous than nitroglycerine. To get an idea of the real thing you must consult a Sears-Roebuck catalogue endorsed by the Anglican Church. On page 23 you will find a picture of Priapus juggling a corkscrew on the end of his weeny; he is standing in the shadow of the Parthenon by mistake; he is naked except for a perforated jock-strap which was loaned for the occasion by the Holy Rollers of Oregon and Saskatchewan.”
“Nothing is accomplished by sweat and struggle. Nearly everything which we call life is just insomnia, an agony because we've lost the habit of falling asleep. We don't know how to let go. We're like a Jack-in-the-box perched on top of a spring and the more we struggle the harder it is to get back in the box.”
“And if they tell you that these things had to be, that things could not have happened otherwise, that France did her best and Germany her best and that little Liberia and little Ecuador and all the other allies also did their best, and that since the war everybody has been doing his best to patch things up or to forget, tell them that their best is not good enough, that we don't want to hear any more this logic of "doing the best one can", tell them we don't want the best of a bad bargain, we don't believe in bargains good or bad, nor in war memorials. We don't want to hear about the logic of events - or any kind of logic. "Je ne parle pas logique," said Montherlant, "je parle generosite." I don't think you heard it very well, since it was in French. I'll repeat it for you, in the Queen's own language; "I'm not talking logic, I'm talking generosity." That's bad English, as the Queen herself might speak it, but it's clear. Generosity - do you hear? You never practice it, any of you, either in peace or in war. You don't know the meaning of the word. You think to supply guns and ammunition to the winning side is generosity; you think sending Red Cross nurses to the front, or the Salvation Army, is generosity. You think a bonus twenty years too late is generosity; you think a little pension and a wheelchair is generosity; you think if you give a man his old job back it's generosity. You don't know what the fucking war means, you bastards! To be generous is to say Yes before the man even opens his mouth. To say Yes you have to first be a Surrealist or a Dadaist, because you have understood what it means to say No. You can even say Yes and No at the same time, provided you do more than is expected of you. Be a stevedore in the daytime and a Beau Brummel in the night-time. Wear any uniform so long as it's not yours. When you write your mother ask her to cough up a little dough so that you may have a clean rag to wipe your ass with. Don't be disturbed if you see your neighbour going after his wife with a knife: he probably has good reason to go after her, and if he kills her you may be sure he has the satisfaction of knowing why he did it. If you're trying to improve your mind, stop it. There's no improving the mind. Look at your heart and gizzard - the brain is in the heart.”
“I said to myself I will never again go to people under false pretences even if it is to give them the Holy Bible. I will never again sell anything, even if I have to starve. I am going home now and I will sit down and really write about people. And if anybody knocks at my door to sell me something I will invite him in and say "why are you doing this?" And if he says it is because he has to make a living I will honor him what money I have and beg him once again to think what he is doing. I want to prevent as many men as possible from pretending that they have to do this or that because they must earn a living. It is not true. One can starve to death - it is much better. Every man who voluntarily starves to death throws another cog into the automatic process. I would rather see a man take a gun and kill his neighbour, in order to get the food he needs, than keep up the automatic process by pretending that he has to make a living.”
“Because Herr Nagel was the unacknowledged saint which every artist is - the man who is ridiculed because his solutions, which are truly profound, seem too simple for the world. No man wants to be an artist - he is driven to it because the world refuses to recognize his proper leadership. Work meant nothing to me, because the real work to be done was being evaded. People regarded me as lazy and shiftless, but on the contrary I was an exceedingly active individual. Even if it was just hunting for a piece of tail, that was something, and well worthwhile, especially if compared to other forms of activity -such as making buttons or turning screws, or even removing appendixes. And why did people listen to me so readily when I applied for a job? Why did they find me entertaining? For the reason, no doubt, that I had always spent my time profitably. I brought them gifts - from my hours at the public library, from my idle ramblings through the streets, from my intimate experiences with women, from my afternoons at the burlesque, from my visits to the museum and the art galleries. Had I been a dud, just a poor honest bugger who wanted to work his balls off for so much a week, they wouldn't have offered me the jobs they did, nor would they have handed me cigars or taken me to lunch or loaned me money as they frequently did. I must have had something to offer which perhaps unknowingly they prized beyond horsepower or technical ability. I didn't know myself what it was, because I had neither pride, nor vanity, nor envy. About the big issues I was dear, but confronted by the petty details of life I was bewildered. I had to witness this same bewilderment on a colossal scale before I could grasp what it was all about Ordinary men are often quicker in sizing up the practical situation: their ego is commensurate with the demands made upon it: the world is not very different from what they imagine it to be. But a man who is completely out of step with the rest of the world is either suffering from a colossal inflation of his ego or else the ego is so submerged as to be practically non-existent. Herr Nagel had to dive off the deep end in search of his true ego; his existence was a mystery, to himself and to every one else. I couldn't afford to leave things hanging in suspense that way - the mystery was too intriguing. Even if I had to rub myself like a cat against every human being I encountered, I was going to get to the bottom of it. Rub long enough and hard enough and the spark will come!”
These are some of the shorter sections that I believe represent the spirit of this masterpiece:
“I remember distinctly how when my mother arrived on a visit she seemed peeved that I was so contented with my new life. She even remarked that I was ungrateful, a remark I never forgot, because then I realized for the first time that to be ungrateful was perhaps necessary and good for one.”
“It was a personal tour in the impersonal world, a man with a tiny trowel in his hand digging a tunnel through the earth to get to the other side. The idea was to tunnel through and find at last the Culebra Cut, the nec plus ultra, of the honeymoon of flesh. And of course there was no end to the digging. The best I might hope for was to get stuck in the dead centre of the earth, where the pressure was strongest and most even all around, and stay stuck there forever. That would give me the feeling of Ixion on the wheel, which is one sort of salvation and not entirely to be sneezed at. On the other hand I was a metaphysician of the instinctivist sort; it was impossible for me to stay stuck anywhere, even in the dead center of the earth. It was most imperative to find and enjoy the metaphysical fuck, and for that I would be obliged to come out on to a wholly new tableland, a mesa of sweet alfalfa and polished monoliths, where the eagles and the vultures flew at random.”
“What is unmentionable is pure fuck and pure cunt; it must be mentioned only in de luxe editions, otherwise the world will fall apart What holds the world together, as I have learned from bitter experience, is sexual intercourse. But fuck, the real thing, cunt, the real thing, seems to contain some unidentified element which is far more dangerous than nitroglycerine. To get an idea of the real thing you must consult a Sears-Roebuck catalogue endorsed by the Anglican Church. On page 23 you will find a picture of Priapus juggling a corkscrew on the end of his weeny; he is standing in the shadow of the Parthenon by mistake; he is naked except for a perforated jock-strap which was loaned for the occasion by the Holy Rollers of Oregon and Saskatchewan.”
“Nothing is accomplished by sweat and struggle. Nearly everything which we call life is just insomnia, an agony because we've lost the habit of falling asleep. We don't know how to let go. We're like a Jack-in-the-box perched on top of a spring and the more we struggle the harder it is to get back in the box.”
“And if they tell you that these things had to be, that things could not have happened otherwise, that France did her best and Germany her best and that little Liberia and little Ecuador and all the other allies also did their best, and that since the war everybody has been doing his best to patch things up or to forget, tell them that their best is not good enough, that we don't want to hear any more this logic of "doing the best one can", tell them we don't want the best of a bad bargain, we don't believe in bargains good or bad, nor in war memorials. We don't want to hear about the logic of events - or any kind of logic. "Je ne parle pas logique," said Montherlant, "je parle generosite." I don't think you heard it very well, since it was in French. I'll repeat it for you, in the Queen's own language; "I'm not talking logic, I'm talking generosity." That's bad English, as the Queen herself might speak it, but it's clear. Generosity - do you hear? You never practice it, any of you, either in peace or in war. You don't know the meaning of the word. You think to supply guns and ammunition to the winning side is generosity; you think sending Red Cross nurses to the front, or the Salvation Army, is generosity. You think a bonus twenty years too late is generosity; you think a little pension and a wheelchair is generosity; you think if you give a man his old job back it's generosity. You don't know what the fucking war means, you bastards! To be generous is to say Yes before the man even opens his mouth. To say Yes you have to first be a Surrealist or a Dadaist, because you have understood what it means to say No. You can even say Yes and No at the same time, provided you do more than is expected of you. Be a stevedore in the daytime and a Beau Brummel in the night-time. Wear any uniform so long as it's not yours. When you write your mother ask her to cough up a little dough so that you may have a clean rag to wipe your ass with. Don't be disturbed if you see your neighbour going after his wife with a knife: he probably has good reason to go after her, and if he kills her you may be sure he has the satisfaction of knowing why he did it. If you're trying to improve your mind, stop it. There's no improving the mind. Look at your heart and gizzard - the brain is in the heart.”
“I said to myself I will never again go to people under false pretences even if it is to give them the Holy Bible. I will never again sell anything, even if I have to starve. I am going home now and I will sit down and really write about people. And if anybody knocks at my door to sell me something I will invite him in and say "why are you doing this?" And if he says it is because he has to make a living I will honor him what money I have and beg him once again to think what he is doing. I want to prevent as many men as possible from pretending that they have to do this or that because they must earn a living. It is not true. One can starve to death - it is much better. Every man who voluntarily starves to death throws another cog into the automatic process. I would rather see a man take a gun and kill his neighbour, in order to get the food he needs, than keep up the automatic process by pretending that he has to make a living.”
“Because Herr Nagel was the unacknowledged saint which every artist is - the man who is ridiculed because his solutions, which are truly profound, seem too simple for the world. No man wants to be an artist - he is driven to it because the world refuses to recognize his proper leadership. Work meant nothing to me, because the real work to be done was being evaded. People regarded me as lazy and shiftless, but on the contrary I was an exceedingly active individual. Even if it was just hunting for a piece of tail, that was something, and well worthwhile, especially if compared to other forms of activity -such as making buttons or turning screws, or even removing appendixes. And why did people listen to me so readily when I applied for a job? Why did they find me entertaining? For the reason, no doubt, that I had always spent my time profitably. I brought them gifts - from my hours at the public library, from my idle ramblings through the streets, from my intimate experiences with women, from my afternoons at the burlesque, from my visits to the museum and the art galleries. Had I been a dud, just a poor honest bugger who wanted to work his balls off for so much a week, they wouldn't have offered me the jobs they did, nor would they have handed me cigars or taken me to lunch or loaned me money as they frequently did. I must have had something to offer which perhaps unknowingly they prized beyond horsepower or technical ability. I didn't know myself what it was, because I had neither pride, nor vanity, nor envy. About the big issues I was dear, but confronted by the petty details of life I was bewildered. I had to witness this same bewilderment on a colossal scale before I could grasp what it was all about Ordinary men are often quicker in sizing up the practical situation: their ego is commensurate with the demands made upon it: the world is not very different from what they imagine it to be. But a man who is completely out of step with the rest of the world is either suffering from a colossal inflation of his ego or else the ego is so submerged as to be practically non-existent. Herr Nagel had to dive off the deep end in search of his true ego; his existence was a mystery, to himself and to every one else. I couldn't afford to leave things hanging in suspense that way - the mystery was too intriguing. Even if I had to rub myself like a cat against every human being I encountered, I was going to get to the bottom of it. Rub long enough and hard enough and the spark will come!”