Henry Miller and How He Got That Way

by Katy Masuga

Identifying six significant writers - Whitman, Dostoevsky, Rimbaud, Lewis Carroll, Proust and D. H. Lawrence - Katy Masuga explores their influence on Miller's work as well as Miller's retroactive impact on their writing. She explores four forms of intertextuality in relation to each 'ancestral' author: direct allusions; unconscious style; reverse influence; and participation of the ancestral author as part of the story within the text. The study is informed by the theories of Bakhtin, Barthes and Kristeva on polyvocity and of Blanchot, Wittgenstein and Deleuze on language games and the indefatigability of writing. By presenting Miller in intertextual context, he emerges as a noteworthy modernist writer whose contributions to literature include the struggle to find a distinctive voice alongside a distinguished lineage of literary figures.Key Features* Major contribution to rehabilitating an important and often overlooked twentieth-century writer* Places Miller's work in thought-provoking intertextual relationships among a diverse range of writers* Provides an incisive critical approach to Miller's writing

208 pages, Hardcover

First published February 23, 2011

Reviews

[Jim Beatty · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best book I've read since I last read Miller.
Dream to live in a world where Constance has one rating and this book has thousands.

No man would set a word down on paper if he had the courage to live out what he believed in. His inspiration is deflected at the source. If it is a world of truth, beauty and magic that he desires to create, why does he put millions of words between himself and the reality of the world? H. Miller