I haven't read Miller in some time. I have the majority of his work and they often stare at me from their shelves. He sits above the collected works of John Fante who is above Mark Twain who... I have over 2,000 books so I probably should stop here... but at any rate Miller has been calling me. I love his honesty and hunger. I love the way he can describe a loaf of bread and the taste of wine and compare it to a poem by a long forgotten Chinese poet. I love how everything is an event. Something to be remembered. A pure moment in one's history. For Miller life was not simple, he saw it as a journey, a conquest not just a passing phase. When you read him you get that itch to experience, to feel, to record and to fuck and write.

If you've ever read Henry Miller you will know he name drops. He tells detailed stories of writers, artists and books long ago devored. In his book The Books In My Life you are lucky enough to stop by his study, pull up a chair, slowly drink a glass of wine and listen to him tell you about the greatest books he has ever read.

What are five books that have changed your life?

 

 

 

it's me and elvis
we're at graceland
he hands me four blue pills, a tiny pink one and a glass of
cold mellow yellow

we're shooting guns and doing drugs
he tells me white panties turn him on and that priscilla's snatch
sometimes tastes like honeycomb cereal

he hums the theme to mission impossible
as we run around the property
shooting

he tells me that the colonel actually has a penis and a vagina
he says, "Like one of them 'Her-maffy-dites'."

the evening ends with us prank calling jerry lee lewis
and pretending to be his cousin jimmy swaggart