Elsewhere

On a snowy day in February 1930, Henry Miller boarded a ship in the New York Harbor and set sail for London—the first stop on a journey that eventually led him to a new life in Paris where he began writing the novels that made him famous.

Some comments on my Espace Henry Miller post have lamented that there is no street in Paris named after Henry Miller. Well, after a bit of searching, I discovered that there is such a street after all.

As he neared his hotel, Miller was stopped in his tracks by the visage of Olga Chekhova staring out from a large theater poster a workman was busy plastering above the Cinéma de Vanves. The movie star’s languid eyes locked with Miller’s. “I’d like to see that film,” Miller called up to the man who smiled down warmly from the top of his ladder, “but I don’t have a cent in my pocket.”

Michael Jones has just returned from a quick trip to Paris and sends along some updated photos of the Café de l’Eléphant.

One of the first Parisian neighborhoods to draw Henry Miller's fascination was the confluence of streets around the boulevard Beaumarchais in the eleventh arrondissement. Of particular appeal was a little tabac where the local prostitutes gathered in the evening.

I recently had a few hours to kill in New York City before heading out to the airport, so I decided to snap some photos of Henry Miller sites around Greenwich Village.