Many people have castigated the shamelessness of the Tropic novels - which for a long time were widely suppressed and illicitly supplied under the counter - and have been at a loss to explain how their author could have simultaneously maintained a career as a serious essayist. In this book, Miller seeks to set the record straight and argues that there is no contradiction between his salacious novels and his philosophy. Throughout his pamphlet, Miller makes liberal use of raw language to narrate his own experiences as a young man and formulate his philosophical conclusions. Motivated both by a mischievous desire to shock and by a candid endeavour to achieve a crude and precise language, Miller triumphs thanks to his entertaining and seductive enthusiasm.