Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #528188 in Books
• Published on: 1969-02-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 320 pages

Customer Reviews

A Pretty Decent Reading List With Some Exceptions
I admit at the outset that I'm not a big fan of Miller-as-author. I find his writing megalomaniacal and egocentric in the extreme. He never seems to tire of telling us about himself and his exploits. He found himself endlessly fascinating, not unlike Rousseau in that respect. His reputation was built in large part as a result of the obscenity charges he faced after the release of Tropic of Cancer. I can still vaguely recall a 60's movie in which an outraged Jimmy Stewart called Sandra Dee out on the carpet for reading Tropic. Reading Miller was considered risque and slightly delinquent back in the 60's and he was cool because he talked dirty. His books sold because a lot of male adolescents like myself wanted to read the "good parts." In retrospect, Frank Harris wrote on similar subjects, but actually had something to say beyond the bedroom as well. Check out Harris' My Life and Loves, if you don't believe me. Harris wins the Miller-Harris author war hands down, in my opinion.

Even if you share my opinion of Miller, you should nevertheless give this book a look. His comments and recommendations are set forth with humor and wit and I agree for the most part with his assessments. He piqued my interest in Celine and made me want to read more of Dostoevski, two of my favorite authors. I'd never heard of Knut Hamsun before reading Books in My Life, but had to give that author a chance, simply on the strength of Miller's fervid recommendation.

I'm not sold on all these recommendations however. I gave Blaise Cendrars a chance, but feel that he probably hasn't been adequately translated. Henri Charriere (Papillon) is a better writer than Cendrars, and provides a more interesting account of the Paris underworld they both write about. Marie Corelli is a semi-hysterical, semi-literate, outdated abomination. Her novels were uniformly panned by critics of the era, with abundant reason. She was the V.C. Andrews of her day, with about a tenth of the talent. I ordered her "Sorrows of Satan' through Amazon and read it at the same time I was re-reading Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita. Both novels deal with an earthly visitation on Satan's part. One is a masterpiece of world literature. The other is a piece of melodramatic tripe written by a literary charlatan. Guess which is which? H. Rider Haggard is fine if you have not yet reached the ripe old age of fifteen. One has to bear in mind that Miller was reading Corelli and Haggard when he was very young, and their works wouldn't have appeared as dated then as they do now.

There have been many books written about books and about reading. I would suggest that if you want to explore one of the more absorbing and entertaining accounts on this long list, read The Books of My Life.

Reading The Books In My Life is like seeing a man made.
THE BOOKS IN MY LIFE is simply outstanding. Reading it was like glimpsing the making of a man. I own another book of Miller's in which he wrote an essay about, and entitled, ON TURNING 80. This was a work by the end product, Henry Miller, the man reflecting on life. He was a very different man than the cocky, young, expatriate who wrote TROPIC OF CANCER. Both of these Henry Millers wrote beautiful and insightful prose.

The thing that is so unique about THE BOOKS IN MY LIFE is that the reader is allowed to see the influences that were involved in the shaping of the man. Hearing him speak of the books he read as a child, SHE and AYESHA and ROBINSON CRUSOE, conjure the very essence of childhood. Miller was nurtured by these books and when he became a man and read Celine and Dostoievsky and Walt Whitman, he continued to be nurtured and subsequently, to grow.

Miller was brilliant because when he wrote about a subject, he touched it. He knew how to truly make contact with it. THE BOOKS IN MY LIFE, like everything he ever wrote, I think, is extraordinary