Henry Miller: A Life - Softcover

Ferguson, Robert

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0393310191 ISBN 13: 9780393310191

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company, 1993

Synopsis

“In this engrossing biography Ferguson measures the cheerful amoralist of Tropic of Cancer and The Rosy Crucifixion against the guilt-ridden, insecure male in revolt against his bourgeois Brooklyn family. . . . The Miller in these pages is neither the macho bully portrayed by feminists nor the adolescent sexual philosopher dismissed by the academic establishment, but a ‘unique...and necessary literary figure,’ a popular American sage....Richly rewarding.” ―Publishers Weekly

The only biography Henry Miller ever wanted was the one he himself wrote in the brash, life-affirming fictions of The Tropic of Capricorn, The Tropic of Cancer, and The Rosy Crucifixion. But Robert Ferguson’s new biography tells a different tale; for where the novels are sexually explicit and brutally frank―woundingly so to those close to Miller―they are also the fantasies of a man escaping from his past, and from himself.

About this title

About the Author:

Robert Ferguson was born in Blackpool in 1948. After completing Norwegian studies at University College in London, he took up a state scholarship in Norway in1983, and has since then lived in Oslo. Ferguson is an award-winning dramatist and has translated and adapted several of Ibsen's plays for the BBC. Apart from Henrik Ibsen: A New Biography he is also the author of two other highly acclaimed biographies, Enigma: The Life of Knut Hamsun and Henry Miller: A Life.

From Library Journal:

These biographies mark the 100th anniversary of Miller's birth. Both describe fully the events of his life, drawing on his autobiographical fiction, nonfiction, and letters, to tell the same basic story with slightly different emphases and interpretations. Dearborn discusses Miller's experiences in terms of his development as a writer. She provides thorough descriptions of how and when various works were written and their publishing history. In her version, Miller turned his life into literature. Ferguson, however, sees Miller's writing as the therapy he needed to come to terms with his life. He takes a psychoanalytical approach, often telling us what Miller felt and what his motives were in particular situations. He is unfortunately sometimes intrusively judgmental. Neither author provides in-depth literary criticism, and they make us aware that a serious critical evaluation of Miller's work is overdue. Dearborn's book is somewhat better written, and while the largest and most specialized collections may want both, hers is the more highly recommended. Both books previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 1/91.
- Judy Mimken, Cardinal Stritch Coll., Milwaukee
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
• Publication date: 1993
• ISBN 10: 0393310191
• ISBN 13: 9780393310191
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 432