Nin, Anais

Henry and June: From "A Journal of Love" -The Unexpurgated Diary of Anais Nin (1931-1932)

Average customer rating:

Brutally and beautifully honest!
If D.H. Lawrence were a barracuda. . .you'd have anais nin.
It's alright
The sexual awakening of Anais Nin
And I'm not even done...

Henry and June: From "A Journal of Love" -The Unexpurgated Diary of Anais Nin (1931-1932)
Anais Nin
Manufacturer: Harvest Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Incest: From "A Journal of Love" -The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin (1932-1934)
The Diary of Anais Nin: Vol. 1 (1931-1934)
Delta of Venus
Tropic of Cancer
Little Birds

ASIN: 015640057X

Book Description

This bestseller covers a single momentous year during Nin’s life in Paris, when she met Henry Miller and his wife, June. “Closer to what many sexually adventuresome women experience than almost anything I’ve ever read....I found it a very erotic book and profoundly liberating” (Alice Walker). The source of a major motion picture from Universal. Preface by Rupert Pole; Index.

Customer Reviews:

Brutally and beautifully honest!.......2007-02-16

A very honest account of a very dishonest period in Nin's life. Highly entertaining, at times liberating (at least for women) and often times very scary (mostly for men). Psychologically fascinating! Interesting peak into Henry Miller's life.

If D.H. Lawrence were a barracuda. . .you'd have anais nin........2006-11-02

Read this interspaced with Tropic of Cancer. You find a more accurate image of Henry Miller's second wife/muse June this way.

I love Nin's work, especially the vast prose of House of Incest. However, at this point in her writing, I just see her clutching copies of D.H. Lawrence's works and using her sexuality to figure out the rest.

I empathize more with the June who inspired the myths, rather than the sanquinary authors lusting after her degredation and ruin. . .and lastly, her love.

Nin was a rebirth to water in terms of literature and her timeframe on earth, but she was flawed. However she was never destroyed by her flaws. A psychic vampire way beyond Warhol proportions, I still adore her.

This is just my vision of the artist. Don't be lazy. Read for yourself. Research in spite of what you read.

It's alright.......2005-09-25

The main thing to remember about this book is that it is a journal. So if you are looking for a beginning, middle and end you won't find it here. I kind of felt like "what is the point?" after I read it. It was also hard for me to understand how Anais Nin could write all these words of love about Henry Miller. I tried to read Miller's TROPIC OF CAPRICORN but I had to stop because he is such a misogynistic jerk. I couldn't believe the feelings of hate he had towards his poor first wife, and the way that he saw all women as trash. I had a hard time not thinking that Anais Nin was crazy to risk her marriage to a wonderful man for a horrible man like Miller. This is not a great book, but the one good thing about it is that it is very sensual and erotic.

The sexual awakening of Anais Nin.......2004-03-15

Anais Nin is the author of over a dozen novels and a very famous diary that is now available in "expurgated" and "unexpurgated" form. All of her works concern one primary theme: women attempting to understand themselves and to make themselves complete human beings after having been psychologically and emotionally stunted in early life. An understanding of Anais Nin's life reveals why this theme preoccupied her: she had a very painful childhood. Her mother married a younger man of lower social pedigree, the parents were in constant conflict (" ... in the house there was always war: great explosions of anger, hatred, revolt. War." - WINTER OF ARTIFICE), her father frequently beat the children and allegedly molested Anais Nin, and her parents eventually separated. The mother took 11-year-old Anais and her two brothers, and the four moved from France to New York. It was on the ship that carried them to their new country that Anais began her diary.

Anais Nin did not keep a diary in the conventional sense, jotting down things that happened to her on a particular day and then offering a few reflections and interpretations. Rather, she portrayed her life in her diary as an unfolding story, positioning herself as the main character of course. The diary became not a mere reflection of her life, but an intense focus of her life. It was as if things had not really happened until she had written them down and read them back to herself. Nin explained that viewing her life as a story made bearable occurrences that would otherwise devastate her. The diary therefore gave her a sense of control over her life (remember, this was the 1930s when women had far less control over their lives than they do now). And as with the fiction, the search for self-understanding and completeness dominated the story she told the diary.

HENRY AND JUNE, based on the diaries 32 through 36, finds Anais Nin in her late 20s and early 30s living outside of Paris with her husband, banker Hugo Guiler. Anais is bored with life and feels unfulfilled, for while Hugo's substantial paycheck can afford a glamorous home, what she longs for is excitement and to be a part of the literary world, not an ornamental and silent companion to social functions. Luckily, she soon meets an unknown writer named Henry Miller. He is opposite to her husband in just about every way: he's older, penniless, irresponsible, and like Anais he is interested in literature, as well as that other Nin preoccupation: sex. (A perhaps revealing detail is that Hugo, though well endowed, occasionally struggled with impotence.) In fact, Miller has been working on a manuscript for about a year. The rest, as they say, is history ... a history revealed in HENRY AND JUNE that I do not want to spoil for the prospective reader. You'll have to get the book. But I must suggest that while reading HENRY AND JUNE it may be beneficial to view the story in the context of Anais Nin's prime preoccupation: the search for completion after having been emotionally stunted in early life. Indeed, on the very first page of the book, Anais tells her cousin, "I need an older man, a father...."

Andrew Parodi

And I'm not even done..........2004-01-26

I was really excited about reading this book, hearing good things about it. I started to read it and couldn't put it down. I am not done with it yet, but I had to write a review before then. The desciptions Anais Nin puts into her journal are so heartfelt and real, you can't help but feel it's you. Her portrayals of the people she meets are so honest and so enlightening...the only thing I could complain about is her ranting about herself, but other than that it is a journey into a time where you wish you were around in.

The Diary of Anais Nin: Vol. 1 (1931-1934)

Average customer rating:

A womans heart ...laid out boldly in words for all to see.
A great read
Wonderfully delicate and erotic
Worth reading
The centerpiece of Anais Nin's controversial career

The Diary of Anais Nin: Vol. 1 (1931-1934)
Anais Nin
Manufacturer: Harvest Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Similar Items:

The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume 2 (1934-1939)
Henry and June: From "A Journal of Love" -The Unexpurgated Diary of Anais Nin (1931-1932)
The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume 3 (1939-1944)
The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume 4 (1944-1947)
The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume 5 (1947-1955)

ASIN: 0156260255

Book Description

This celebrated volume begins when Nin is about to publish her first book and ends when she leaves Paris for New York. Edited and with a Preface by Gunther tuhlmann; Index.

Customer Reviews:

A womans heart ...laid out boldly in words for all to see. .......2005-12-31

ANAIS has been someone who has carried me through some tough times in the past...I read her at twenty...and twenty-three and twenty-six. Her troubles were my own and we were kin. She is meant to be read by anyone who loves life...in it's full fleshy sometimes heart rending reality. She writes with the open-heart of a poet, and leaves the reader feeling more than fed. READ ANAIS NIN!

A great read.......2004-10-08

I recomend reading Anais Nin's diary. The book is such poetic prose. Some sentences really took my breath away, the way she can captivate something so beautiful and human in simple words. Since it is a diary, its main focus is her life, but its not selfish, infact she mentions herself very little. The main focus is Henry (Miller) and June, his wife. When Ananis Nin falls inlove with someone, so does the reader. Her descriptive skills gave me goosebumps, you really can see it in your minds eye, hear the music or feel the softness of skin. I highly recomend this to anyone thinking about reading this book, you will come away with a slice of life from 1930's France.

Wonderfully delicate and erotic.......2004-07-30

This is one of the most profound works of literature I have ever read. Nin leads you directly into her life, the nature of the people around her, her feelings and internal conflicts. She writes delicately and powerfully and womanly. Everyone should have a chance to read this.

Worth reading.......2004-04-11

A bit long and occasionally dense, but overall, a worthwhile and insightful glimpse into the life of a remarkable, thoughtful writer in 1930s France.

The centerpiece of Anais Nin's controversial career.......2003-11-19

After decades of producing fiction that was rejected by mainstream readership and reviewers for being self-centered, exotic in prose, filled with psychological theory, and coterie in style, Anais finally found acceptance by integrating all of the above in this published version of her diary. Timing is everything, I suppose. The world of the 1930s-50s simply was not ready for her. The Aquarian generation of the 1960s was. When originally published this volume did not have a number in the title because no one thought it would sell enough to warrant a second volume. To the surprise of many, it would become the first in seven volumes - and then over 20 years later the unexpurgated versions of her diaries would be published, revealing that Anais was at the time having an affair with Henry Miller. Eventually this material would be fashioned into the movie "Henry and June" (which I highly recommend). It would also pave the way for the re-issue of many of Anais Nin's long since out-of-print earlier fiction.

Anais Nin began a letter to her father, on the ship that carried her, her mother and brothers, away from him, away from Europe and to New York City. The letter was never sent (her mother did not think it appropriate), but instead developed into a diary she would continue to keep for decades. In this volume we meet Anais Nin living just outside of Paris with her husband, banker Hugh Guiler (who is barely visible in the diary, a point of contention for many who did not know that this was at his request). She has just published her study of DH Lawrence and is about to meet Henry Miller and his fascinating wife June (Nin's descriptions of June are among the most beautiful portions of her work). Her father soon reenters her life. This is a very exciting time in her life!

But what have I listed above? Nothing but a pile of facts. Facts are often boring, and seldom poetic - two accusations rarely leveled against Anais Nin. It was only after submerging myself in the history of this volume that I came to realize this: the linear history of this diary does not really matter; the accusations that Anais Nin lied about her life are immaterial. Anais Nin had a beautiful way with words and she was a master of crafting an image, of creating a persona. She was not truly the person she portrays in this volume, which she edited with Gunther Stuhlmann. But this is a beautiful and unique piece of literature that paved the way for many future artists, particularly female writers (Alice Walker has praised her work as profoundly liberating, and I can't help but think Maya Angelou took a cue from Anais Nin's concept of the continuous autobiographical novel). I have come to believe that it is not the possibility that she lied about her life that has upset so many people (some of whom refer to this as a "liary"), but that a woman should have such control over her own portrayal all the while defying so many of society's conventions.

Anais Nin may not have truly been the woman she portrays in this or future volumes, but it is the woman she wanted to believe she was - wanted the world to believe she was. I find that quite revealing, as revealing as any diary should be.

Andrew Parodi

Average customer rating:

a little twisted but not erotically
Classic erotica
Pure genius
Wonderful!
Little Birds

Little Birds
Anais Nin
Manufacturer: Harvest Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Similar Items:

Delta of Venus
Henry and June: From "A Journal of Love" -The Unexpurgated Diary of Anais Nin (1931-1932)
The Diary of Anais Nin: Vol. 1 (1931-1934)
Incest: From "A Journal of Love" -The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin (1932-1934)
House Of Incest

ASIN: 0156029049

Book Description

Evocative and superbly erotic, Little Birds is a powerful journey into the mysterious world of sex and sensuality. From the beach towns of Normandy to the streets of New Orleans, these thirteen vignettes introduce us to a covetous French painter, a sleepless wanderer of the night, a guitar-playing gypsy, and a host of others who yearn for and dive into the turbulent depths of romantic experience.

Customer Reviews:

a little twisted but not erotically.......2007-05-27

definitely not the erotica I was expecting. there's some interesting twisted stuff but if you're looking for a turn on in a traditional erotic fashion, this might not do it. interesting read tho.

Classic erotica.......2007-01-18

Beautifully written erotic short stories exploring a range of sexual and sensual indulgences, some explicit and some sublime.

Pure genius.......2006-08-09

I cannot praise Anais enough. Her writing captures you emotionally and then sets you afire with her raw sexuality. The book is mesmerizing. Pure passion.

Wonderful!.......2006-07-29

This is a wonderful collection of erotic writing from a true master of the genre. I have my grave doubts though if men can truely appreciate this work.

Little Birds.......2005-07-29

Not as good as The Delta of Venus. If you are interested in classic erotica I would try Delta of Venus instead.

Average customer rating:

interesting but not necessarily erotic
Nin in fine form...sort of
One of the classics
I expected something deeper
Raping children, incest, & child abuse is EROTICA?!?

Delta of Venus
Anais Nin
Manufacturer: Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Similar Items:

Little Birds
Henry and June: From "A Journal of Love" -The Unexpurgated Diary of Anais Nin (1931-1932)
The Diary of Anais Nin: Vol. 1 (1931-1934)
Incest: From "A Journal of Love" -The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin (1932-1934)
Tropic of Cancer

ASIN: 1579125743

Book Description

In Delta of Venus Anaïs Nin penned a lush, magical world where the characters of her imagination possess the most universal of desires and exceptional of talents. Among these provocative stories, a Hungarian adventurer seduces wealthy women then vanishes with their money; a veiled woman selects strangers from a chic restaurant for private trysts; and a Parisian hatmaker named Mathilde leaves her husband for the opium dens of Peru. Delta of Venus is an extraordinarily rich and exotic collection from the master of erotic writing.

Customer Reviews:

interesting but not necessarily erotic.......2007-05-27

there is a lot of interesting prose in this book but it's not the erotica I was expecting. she's got interesting things to say and discuss but if you're looking for something to turn you on, this might not be it.

Nin in fine form...sort of.......2007-05-16

The great work of Anais Nin's life was her diary, and everything else she wrote, no matter how much energy and passion she invested in it, seemed distracted and a bit colorless. This erotica is no exception, and it also has the distinction of being composed to the tune of a tightrope act; Nin was required to deliver hardcore sex, but she could not help adding her own poetry to it. The conditions of composition are here important to whether or not you'll enjoy this semi-hardcore, semi-erotica writing.

If you're a Nin fan, however, this is a must-have.

One of the classics.......2007-03-30

This is one of the classics of sex and eroticism. As a teen, I stole my mother's copy and it inspired many a fantasy. The writing is wonderful and the sex is, well, just hot. I've ready many similar books since then, like right now I am reading Abby Lee's Diary of a Sex Fiend: Girl with a One Track Mind. Reading about sex is always "stimulating" but this classic has lasted generations.

I expected something deeper.......2007-03-09

I guess I was expecting better writing from Nin. I have heard so many good things about her writing and I have read a few books by one of her "good friends", Henry Miller, that I decided to pick up Delta of Venus and was a bit disappointed. In the introduction Anais Nin describes the conditions under which she wrote much of what is contained in this book. Some wealthy "collector" had commissioned erotica at the rate of $1/page and he was not interested in anything but the physical act of sex. Well, Nin delivered. Much of the content is the description of various sexual situations and lacks what I would consider art. Reading Delta of Venus I felt like I was reading at more tasteful version of Letters to Penthouse. I must admit, this is my first exposure to Nin so I am not saying she is not a gifted author. I understand she was commissioned to write stories of this nature, I'm just saying I expected something more.

Raping children, incest, & child abuse is EROTICA?!? .......2006-11-06

I found this book to be highly disturbing. If you're looking for a sultry read I would definitly NOT recommend. I am about as open minded and sexually liberated as they come and usually I thoroughly enjoy erotica. However, I could not get past the first chapter of this book. This is the first and only book I have ever returned and received a refund for within two hours of purchasing it. Within the first chapter, the author begins depicting sex games between an adult male and 10 & 12 years old girls! She then describes the main charachter raping his daughters and forcing sexual acts on his sleeping son. How is this "exquisite" literature?!? Would it be okay to purchase a video or a photograph of this happening? Condoning imagery of forced sex with children is far beyond acceptable imagery. By allowing these kinds of images to be glorified we are saying "it's okay to think about children in a sexual way." Not only is that disturbing but its not EROTIC! That is terrifying! There are a great many things we adults may fantasize about doing to each other. There are plenty of people in the world who think even consenting adults shouldn't be able to control their own sex lives. I am not one of those. I do, however, feel that children have NO PART of adult fantasies. I'm amazed that this book has come so far with people glorifying such sad acts as "erotica."

Linotte: The Early Diary of Anais Nin (1914-1920)

Average customer rating:

Good background, but not for the casual reader
Prelude to the Storm
Modest Beginnings
Lionette

Linotte: The Early Diary of Anais Nin (1914-1920)
Anais Nin
Manufacturer: Harvest Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0156523868

Book Description

A charming and amusing view of Nin's early life, from age eleven to seventeen; the self-portrait of an innocent girl who is transformed, through her own insights, into an enlightened young woman. "An enchanting portrait of a girl's constant search for herself" (Library Journal). Preface by Joaquin Nin-Culmell; Index; photographs and drawings. Translated by Jean L. Sherman.

Customer Reviews:

Good background, but not for the casual reader.......2007-05-16

This book is pretty interesting if you've already read a good deal of Anais Nin's diary. Her early years are somewhat nondescript as European children go, however, so there isn't much here for the historian or for those who like their memoirs spicy and strange (cf Running With Scissors). If you are a serious Nin fan, you'll probably want to read this, but you aren't missing much if you don't. If you're not really a fan, you won't find much of interest here.

Prelude to the Storm.......2002-09-09

For fans of Anais Nin, this unedited early diary is a must. Written in the years immediately preceding the events revealed in her books HENRY AND JUNE and INCEST, this diary is the connecting link that reveals how a virtuous, loving wife became a wild adventurous. The writing is simply gorgeous; you'll be amazed at how polished and vivid her discriptions of life in Paris of the 1920s were (and yes, this book was printed AS IS from the original journals). Ironically, she describes her initial disgust with Parisian "sensuality," as well as her growing acceptance and eventual delight with the city. She describes her homes, friends, and her interest in Spanish dance. But perhaps most importantly, she describes her marriage to Hugh Guiler, a man she loves but who does not satisfy her physically. Read this book so as to understand how Anais was eventually driven into the arms of Henry Miller.

Modest Beginnings.......2001-11-24

This volume of writing offers the careful reader glimpses of Anais Nin before she reinvented herself. Or does it? One can never be sure with Nin.

The girl who became Anais Nin, scandalous diarist, was clearly highly articulate, and determined to live a life of Art and Passion, even when her mother was making her do housework as a teenager in their modest rental house in Queens. It provides a gentle introduction to her life and times, and a fascinating contrast to searing works such as _Incest_, taken from diary material written some twenty or so years later. One also gets some interesting views of early-twentieth century New York City.

The book, taken in the context of Nin's later work, offers evidence that we become what we most want to be. Dreamer, beware!

Lionette.......2000-02-03

Even if you've read other works of Anais, you must read this journal. Beginning at age 11, young Anais introduces you to a sad, young girl who has matured well beyond her years. However, her passion and desire remain the same. She knew at that young age that she was meant to do nothing else but write.

The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume 2 (1934-1939)

Average customer rating:

A coherent extension of the first volume
Anais is always searching

The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume 2 (1934-1939)
Anais Nin
Manufacturer: Harvest/HBJ Book
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Similar Items:

The Diary of Anais Nin: Vol. 1 (1931-1934)
The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume 3 (1939-1944)
The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume 4 (1944-1947)
The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume 5 (1947-1955)
The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume 6 (1955-1966)

ASIN: 0156260263

Book Description

Beginning with Nin's arrival in New York, this volume is filled with the stories of her analytical patients. There is a shift in emphasis also as Nin becomes aware of the inevitable choice facing the artist in the modern world. "Sensitive and frank...[Nin's] diary is a dialogue between flesh and spirit" (Newsweek). Edited and with a Preface by Gunther Stuhlmann; Index.

Customer Reviews:

A coherent extension of the first volume.......2004-01-01

Anais Nin began a letter to her father, on the ship that carried her, her mother and brothers, away from him, away from Europe and to New York City. She was 11 at the time. The letter was never sent (her mother did not think it appropriate), but instead developed into a diary that would become legendary by the time she reached her late 20s. Henry Miller helped feed the legend by stating that, once published, Anais Nin's diary would take its place beside the great literary revelations of the century. Upon publication in the 1960s, many critics, and audiences alike, felt that the acclaim was justified. Though original plans called for the publication of only one volume, demand was so great that seven volumes in all would be eventually be published; then, of course, the "unexpurgated" versions would be published in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

In the first volume of the diary, we meet Anais Nin living outside of Paris with her husband, banker Hugh Guiler. She has just published her study of DH Lawrence and is about to meet Henry Miller and his fascinating and dramatic wife, June. All characters from the previous volume factor into this second installment, but many new people are introduced. Gonzalo, a Peruvian Marxist, and his wife Helba, are the most interesting new characters. Famous Freudian analyst Otto Rank is also depicted. Anais works with Rank in New York; she struggles to understand whether she is meant to be an analyst or a writer. Yes, in what strikes me as an odd occurence, Anais Nin - with no formal training - is allowed to take on patients.

Of the first two volumes, I'd have to say that this is my favorite. There is more movement, and with World War II as a backdrop, there is more social conscience on display. "Politics, all of them," Anais writes in an astute observation that, sadly, is still true 70 years later, "seemed rotten to the core and all based on economics, not humanitarianism." Indeed, in this volume Anais seems more aware of the world around her and less preoccupied with herself, well, a little less so. But, as with all other volumes in this series of diaries, and just about all of Anais Nin's literature, the reader is wise to look more for poetic truth than literal reality. What I mean is, the diaries of Anais Nin are most likely not verbatim transcriptions of the manuscript versions (the difference between this original series and the unexpurgated versions pretty much proves this point). They are something closer to being stylized, masterfully edited "memory books" and persona self-creation. But it's an entertaining, romantic, and often beautiful persona.

Andrew Parodi

Anais is always searching.......2002-12-21

This book has so much wisdom. I find myself reading it very slowly to stop and really think about what she has to say. This volume of her diary is more disconnected than the one prior, but the insight is much more profound.

Cities Of Interior: Contains 5 Volumes In Nin'S Continuous

Average customer rating:

Look into your lovers' hearts...

Cities Of Interior: Contains 5 Volumes In Nin'S Continuous
Anais Nin
Manufacturer: Swallow Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

Collages
Incest: From "A Journal of Love" -The Unexpurgated Diary of Anaïs Nin (1932-1934)
Henry and June: From "A Journal of Love" -The Unexpurgated Diary of Anais Nin (1931-1932)
Delta of Venus
Under Glass Bell (Swallow Paperbook)

ASIN: 0804006660

Customer Reviews:

Look into your lovers' hearts..........1998-07-07

Though any of the five mini masterpieces that constitute this cyclical novel ("Ladders to Fire", "Children of the Albatross", "The Four-Chambered Heart", "A Spy in the House of Love", and "Seduction of the Minotaur") stand on their own as seperate and equally moving novels, I'm finding it difficult to describe the importance "Cities of the Interior" has held in my (and countless others') heart since my first reading of it.

The narcisism of which Anais Nin has been continually accused could be found here in "Cities of the Interior" during the most cursory of surface-readings (I suppose the same could be said of any writer who has been published to a mass market?) but, it is precisely her singular ability to delve into the depths of her most secret heart that allows her to reveal the core motivations for even the smallest of sensual gestures of her literary characterisations.

These revelations, couched in some of the most memorable and intimate prose you're ever likely to read, are the keys that can unlock the restrictive bonds we all place on our relationships with those closest to us, and perhaps more importanly, the restrictions that keep those with whom we SHOULD be close at arms-length.

Book Description

The intimacy between Nin and Miller, first disclosed in Henry and June, is documented further in this impassioned exchange of letters between the two controversial writers. Edited and with an Introduction by Gunther Stuhlmann; Index.

Customer Reviews:

Henry Miller.......2003-05-08

Big fan of these two, but more of a Henry Miller fan personally. The letters bring Henry Miller out of his fiction/novels and bring him into the realm where Nin was in writing her Diaries. Good for that reason, two lovers but volatile ones. Testing sexual boundaries is a touchy thing, after all.

Delirium and Denial.......2003-02-26

When two writers fall in love, they write and write and write. Their writing being the best expression of their inner natures. Here Anais and Henry write two-hundred-and fifty letters back and forth in a passionate literary romance. The friendship is passionate from the start and Anais is poised for an intellectual and physical adventure. These letters are heady intellectual exchanges as both writers realize themselves in words.

Most of the letters do seem to focus on their literary loves of the moment. D.H. Lawrence is discussed in detail because of Anais' essays and "Unprofessional Study of D.H. Lawrence," in the 1930s. Henry suggests that they thrash things out by letter and asks her to keep his letters. I'm almost certain she would never have thought to destroy them. Not in this life!

In these letters, Henry divulges his most intimate thoughts about Anais. He writes her about everything he does as if to make a literary life with her. This place they both share is ecstasy to them both. Words connect the borders of their world.

Both writers desperately hang onto their real lives while all the while wanting desperately to be together in some fantasy situation. Henry dreams of just living simply, but we know Anais needs luxury almost as much as love. She does however sacrifice a lot for Henry in many ways. The fact is, she supports him financially for years.

Perhaps she feels she owes him her life. At the start of this relationship, Anais was at the point of wanting to kill herself over her imaginary lover, John. A man who rejected her before even accepting her in many ways. It does seem that she needs a reason to live. Someone to care for as she doesn't have her own children. Perhaps in a way, Henry becomes her child although she is 28 and he is 40 when they meet. She does not seem satisfied in her marriage.

I am not sure why Hugh's love is not enough. Everything she writes about Hugh is so complimentary. Maybe it is because Hugh is not completely dedicated to writing. Henry is drunk with desire to write and to experience life to the fullest. In Anais, he finds a soul mate.

Henry is serious, silly and seductive. I was imagining Anais laughing-out-loud at some of his adorable recollections. He may have been open and frank, but his love for her was a completely beautiful expression. She makes him so happy because he can talk to her about anything. There is no need to hide feelings. They talk about the most intense emotional situations.

Anais' friendship and sympathy is everything to Henry. What I noticed was how she tells Henry all her deepest desires just like she tells her diary. Until a certain point when she seems to draw back sharply. I assume some letters where lost. This is where reading her journals will become more interesting. I have only read a few and now I am interested in reading the rest. I must know her thoughts between "some" of the letters from Henry. Otherwise, the picture will never be complete.

It is enjoyable to see how the letters start formally and then at times just go off into the most intoxicating thoughts. What amazes the mind is their intense focus on the evaluation of their own writing. Here you see how each book came to be and realize the force of the influence of small comments, advice, notes.

I'm convinced that any woman would sell her soul to receive letters with such passion. Yet, it seems Anais wanted more. We can't quite figure out what she wanted, but she wanted perhaps a carbon copy of herself? She is much better suited to living with Hugo and so she lives out her romantic dreams with Henry until writing and publishing take hold of them both and swirl them into the inevitability of their destiny.

Anais brings beauty to Henry's existence, which is often far below her standard of living. Could he have provided for her in a way that satisfied her? Was her giving him financial help beautiful because he accepted it in such a way that in return he gave her love? At the end of the book the tables turn and Henry is able to pay Anais back for all her love and attention. In this way, the book becomes beautiful despite the human frailty of both writers.

What I thought many would object to probably does not need mentioning, but you can see various attitudes of racism here and there. There is also the question of Anais Nin's common sense in regards to her father and her views on parents are hardly acceptable. I force myself to overlook various aspects because the overall content is in many ways rather incredible.

What you have in this book, is a man "in love" pouring out his very soul and a woman slowly but surely becoming estranged from him. There seems to be no way these two writers can be together and yet through the years, Anais and Henry support and encourage one another through their letters.

They also seem to occasionally have a inclination towards mentally torturing one another. As one runs about the world in one direction, the other follows. At one point Anais feels that what he is asking her to accept is beyond what a human being should have to endure. She pulls away.

Could the life they dreamed of really have brought them happiness? Was it not the constant struggle that spurned them on to write. That is my conclusion. That writers need to struggle. To feel and to die and be reborn. This is fully evident in "A Literate Passion."

When reading the letters between Henry and Anais, I am a butterfly on the wall of their world and my wings beat happily as I watch their most intimate thoughts flow by me in words.

Read after "Henry & June."

~TheRebeccaReview.com

Yes! Ah, ah, yes!.......2003-01-08

Forget Nin's works of fiction, the journals, letters, and life are truly worth experiencing over and over again for their honesty, passion, and viewing the internal turned external for our benefit. Everyone knows of Miller's and Nin's relationhip, through "Henryand June" if anything, but it is through this work that we see them less as romantic figures and more as humans capable of the idiocy, devotion, and prolongation of things we should all end and just don't for whatever reason. This is a great buy if you are a lover a letters. Reading "Fire" is a must, however.

Spying In The House of Love.......2001-11-24

Like many others, I have been fascinated with and frustrated by Anais Nin for many years, since reading the first volume of her expurgated diary in 1977.

This volume of letters enables the reader who has already read other versions of the Nin-Miller story to form additional conclusions about what might actually have happened. Because the letters were sent into the possession of others, they were less subject to the constant revision and reinvention that bedevils all attempts to determine objective facts about the mercurial Nin.

If you are not already an amateur historian of literary trends of the 1930's, fear not. The letters are worth reading as an introduction to Anais Nin and Henry Miller as well, for they depict a real-life romance conducted by two who absolutely relished the game and were highly articulate in dramatically different ways.

The Language of Sexual Liberation.......2000-10-12

Whatever you may think of her writing, Anaïs Nin was definitely a femme fatale. Henry Miller was, he claimed, the "happiest man alive." Together, Nin and Miller created a literary language for sexual fulfillment; she in a diary whose original form still remains unpublished, he in novels banned in both the United States and England until court cases in the early 1960s permitted their publication and turned Miller into something Nin had already achieved: the status of a cult hero.

Nin and Miller met in Paris in 1931. Miller, an aspiring novelist, wanted to meet the banker's pretty wife who had sung the praises of D.H. Lawrence and whose books had been deemed "pornography" outside of France. Neither Nin nor Miller, at that point, had published much. Their mutual interest, as they freely admit, was in sex and in each other and, consequently, they began a long affair.

It was during this affair that both Nin and Miller produced their finest writing--the writings that would eventually become Nin's two diaries and her novel, House of Incest, as well as Miller's Tropic of Cancer and Black Spring. Each believed in, and nurtured, the others genius and Miller wrote that Nin's diary would take its place "beside the revelations of St. Augustine, Petronius, Abelard, Proust and others."

Miller, only forty-one, but already somewhat down-and-out, fascinated the twenty-nine year old Nin, whose vague yearnings filled the many pages of the diary she had been keeping since the age of ten. "He's a man who makes life drunk. He is like me," she mused. Nin and Miller, however, were not alike. One of their most essential differences was a difference typical between men and women--Nin censored herself, while the world censored Miller.

Published in 1963, Nin's diary caused a literary sensation. It was begun as a letter to her father, a man who abandoned the family when Nin was only ten, and it remained intensely private. Revised into frequent distortions, the diary was a record of a compulsion to conceal as much as of a quest for feminine fulfillment. A mixture of fact, fantasy and calculated lies, Nin's editor asserts that the diary nevertheless presents a "psychological" truth. Kate Millett hailed Nin as "the mother of us all" and the women's movement immediately embraced her writings. Author Erica Jong said that no woman had told "the story of women's sexuality" more honestly than had Nin.

Despite the praise, if we read between the lines, while still observing Nin's frenetic whirl from bed to bed, we come to realize that she was really never satisfied. Her insatiable appetite aside, Nin was, at heart, a prudish libertine. Her childhood molestation by her father, whom she, herself, seduced as an adult a year after meeting Henry Miller, seems to have contributed greatly to her private inhibitions. Although she flitted from bed to bed she sadly confessed, "I am hellishly lonely." Instead of sex, Nin longed for "what I give Henry: this constant attentiveness."

In the "Black Lace Laboratory," as Miller's apartment was dubbed, Nin and Miller conducted literary and erotic experiments, prompting Nin to write him a thinly disguised warning to herself, "Beware just a little of your hypersexuality!" Toward the end of his life, unable to write about women except as prostitutes, Miller claimed not to know what the sexual revolution was about, saying that he had always loved and honored women. Nin agreed, saying that Miller was a romantic, rather than a rake. At eighty, Miller confessed that far too many people engaged in sex without love.

Basking in the warmth of Nin's caresses, her skilled editing of his work, and the material possessions she lavished upon him, Miller wrote prolifically and with a rare genius. Eventually, his romance with Nin faded (or warmed) into friendship, but the legacy of their literary teamwork remained: In 1974, Nin was elected to the National Institute of Arts and Letters. The Los Angeles Times names her Woman of the Year in 1976, the same year Henry Miller received France's Legion d'honneur. The 1990 movie, Henry and June is a chronicle of Miller's affair with Nin, which later became a triangle involving Miller's wife, June.

Nin and Miller have become cultural icons. Nin is the focus of women's study courses as well as being included in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations. Miller and his work need no comment. Although both Nin and Miller were pioneers of free speech and sexual freedom, and both helped to forge a new literature and a new culture, the ultimate emptiness of their lives, with its attendant lack of depth and meaning point to the futility of their attempt to wrest security and happiness from sexuality alone.

The Early Diary of Anais Nin, Vol. 3 (1923-1927)
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The Early Diary of Anais Nin, Vol. 3 (1923-1927)
Anais Nin
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Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0156272504

Book Description

A bridge between the early life of Nin and the first volume of her Diary. In pages more candid than in the preceding diaries, Nin tells how she exorcised the obsession that threatened her marriage and nearly drove her to suicide. Editor's Note by Rupert Pole; Preface by Joaquin Nin-Culmell; Index; photographs.

The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume 7 (1966-1974)

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The Diary Of Anais Nin, Volume 7 (1966-1974)
Anais Nin
Manufacturer: Harvest/HBJ Book
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Authors | Arts & Literature | Biographies & Memoirs | Subjects | Books

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Book Description

The final volume ends as the author wished-not with her last two years of pain but at a joyous, reflective moment on a trip to Bali. "One of the most remarkable diaries in the history of letters" (Robert Kirsch, Los Angeles Times). Edited and with a Preface by Gunther Stuhlmann; Index; photographs.

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