Henry Miller Quotes from Tropic of Capricorn
- "Once you have given up the ghost, everything follows with dead certainty, even in the midst of chaos."
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
- "My people were entirely Nordic, which is to say idiots."
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
- "History may deny it, since I have played no part in the history of my people, but even if everything I say is wrong, is prejudiced, spiteful, malevolent, even if I am a liar and a poisoner, it is nevertheless the truth and it will have to be swallowed."
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
- "The moment you have a 'different' thought you cease to be an American."
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
- "From Times Square to Fiftieth Street all that St. Thomas Aquinas forgot to include in his magnum opus is here included, which is to say, among other things, hamburger sandwiches, collar buttons, poodle dogs, slot machines, gray bowlers, typewriter ribbons, orange sticks, free toilets, sanitary napkins, mint jujubes, billiard balls, chopped onions, crinkled doilies, manholes, chewing gum, sidecars and sourballs, cellophane, cord tires, magnetos, horse liniment, cough drops, feenamint, and that feline opacity of the hysterically endowed eunuch who marches to the soda fountain with a sawed-off shotgun between his legs."
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
- "At each end of the floor there is a sign reading 'No Improper Dancing Allowed.' Well and good. No harm in placing a sign at each end of the floor. In Pompeii they probably hung a phallus up. This is the American way. It means the same thing."
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
- "Confusion is a word we have invented for an order which is not understood."
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
- "It is Sunday morning and I am lying blissfully dead to the world on my bed of ferroconcrete. Around the corner is the cemetery, which is to say -- the world of sexual intercourse."
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
- "In the chaos of Bloomingdale's there is an order, but this order is absolutely crazy to me: it is the order which I would find on the head of a pin if I were to put it under the microscope. It is the order of an accidental series of accidents accidentally conceived. This order has, above all, an odor -- and it is the odor of Bloomingdale's which strikes terror into my heart."
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
- "All my Calvaries were rosy crucifixions, pseudo-tragedies to keep the fires of hell burning brightly for the real sinners who are in danger of being forgotten."
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
- "The heating and cooling system is one system, and Cancer is separated from Capricorn only be an imaginary line."
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
- "For years now I have been trying to tell this story; each time I have started out I have chosen a different route. I am like an explorer who, wishing to circumnavigate the globe, deems it unnecessary to carry even a compass."
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
- "Tack your womb up on my wall, so that I may remember you. We must get going. Tomorrow, tomorrow. . . "
- Henry Miller, Tropic of Capricorn (1938)
rri (August 22, 2010)
