Reviews for Tropic of Cancer

The average rating for Tropic of Cancer based on 2 reviews is 5 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2008-09-23 00:00:00 Joseph Matthews So, I was glancing through some of the reviews here and noticed that someone has totally disparaged this book because its "hero" is immoral. It always bewilders me when people judge a book according to the moral judgment that they pass on its characters. Like when I was looking at the reviews of John Updike's Run, Rabbit and saw a woman saying that she hated the book because Angstrom left his wife twice in the book. I was like, don't take it personally, lady; he's not your husband. A lot of people do it. They ignore the book and get too tangled up in how likeable the characters are. I really don't get this. Someone should explain it to me. Is Lolita a bad book because it's about a pedophile? Should writers feel like their characters will be competing in a popularity contest in the minds of the readers? Should we then only read books about angels floating happily in Heaven, doing good things? Aren't evil and immorality - whatever they mean - facts of life that should be dissected and explained by literature? I didn't bother with the morality of the hero. I don't care if he slept with a whore and then stole her money and ran away. Who cares? Look at all that delicious writing instead, all the ranting and raving of a tormented and brilliant mind, and the brutal honesty of it. I don't know why publishers still insist on marketing this book for its "explicit language and breaking of sexual taboos in literature." That's just so passé in an age when even pornography makes us yawn. The beauty of this book lies somewhere else.

Review # 2 was written on 2007-08-06 00:00:00 A. P. Lilley This may be the greatest book ever written. This opening passage proves it: "I have no money, no resources, no hopes. I am the happiest man alive. A year ago, six months ago, I thought I was an artist. I no longer think about it. I am. Everything that was literature has fallen from me. There are no more books to be written, thank God. This then? This is not a book. This is libel, slander, defamation of character. This is not a book, in the ordinary sense of the word. No, this is a prolonged insult, a gob of spit in the face of Art, a kick in the pants to God, Man, Destiny, Time, Love, Beauty ... what you will. I am going to sing for you, a little off key perhaps, but I will sing. I will sing while you croak, I will dance over your dirty corpse.... To sing you must first open your mouth. You must have a pair of lungs, and a little knowledge of music. It is not necessary to have an accordian, or a guitar. The essential thing is to want to sing. This then is a song. I am singing."