The talented Mr. Miller ...

... Book Review: Renegade - WSJ.com. (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)

A few years ago, the Library of America put out a huge anthology called "Americans in Paris," and Miller turned up in it as just one more literary tourist, perfectly at ease in the company of Henry Adams and Edith Wharton. Now that's the stuff Miller really would have loved. The books he wrote after "Tropic"—which even Mr. Turner concedes are mostly terrible—show him eager to pose as a great sage, laying down the law about everything from the soul of Greek culture to the poetry of Arthur Rimbaud. They make "Tropic's" gibes against art seem like the sour grapes of the kid longing to get through the clubhouse door.

I beg to differ. I have long thought that Tropic of Cancer suffers from having been written in Paris about Paris.Tropic of Capricorn, however, written in Paris about Brooklyn, thrives from the distance. And even Van Wyck Brooks thought highly of The Colossus of Maroussi -- as did my wife after a trip to Greece. I also think The Time of the Assassins is actually a pretty good take on Rimbaud.