Henry Miller (1891–1980) was an American author who developed a unique literary style that was simultaneously autobiographical, philosophical, and narrative. He was born on December 26, 1891, in Brooklyn, New York. His father was a tailor who owned his own business, and he had a sister with an intellectual disability. Although he was a good student, he left college after only two months and wandered across America as far as Alaska. After returning home, he worked at various jobs and even opened a shop selling alcohol during the Prohibition era. In 1917, he married an amateur pianist and became a father. From 1920 onward, he worked for a telegraph company.
In 1924, he left his job and family to live with a dancer on Broadway. During this period, he began writing, but without success. In 1930, he moved to Paris and devoted himself entirely to literature. He soon ran out of money and survived with the help of friends. One of the people who supported him financially was Anaïs Nin, with whom he and his wife formed a famous love triangle later described in detail in the book Henry and June. In 1934, he published his first major work, Tropic of Cancer, in Paris, followed by Black Spring (1936) and Tropic of Capricorn (1939). His books were banned in the United States as pornographic until the 1960s.
He left Paris in 1939 and traveled to Greece, where he lived for about six months. He then returned to America and journeyed across the country, experiences that inspired The Air-Conditioned Nightmare, a travel memoir containing a sharp criticism of American society and its values. In 1944, Miller married a philosophy student thirty years younger than himself and settled in California. He continued writing and publishing several works, including the autobiographical trilogy Sexus (1949), Plexus (1953), and Nexus (1960). He got divorced in 1951 and married again in 1953. Henry Miller died in California on June 7, 1980.
