Making Sexus : toward a genetic study of Henry Miller's The Rosy Crucifixion

This dissertation explores the genesis of Henry Miller’s three-volume magnum opus, The Rosy Crucifixion: Sexus (1949), Plexus (1952), and Nexus (1959). Its primary aim is to provide an abundantly documented account of the planning, composition, and revision of the trilogy’s first book, Sexus, while establishing the documentary record needed to extend the investigation to Plexus and Nexus. To tell the story of Sexus, I trace continuities and changes in Miller’s writing processes across the better part of his career, reinscribing the trilogy’s genesis within the broader ecosystem of his entire oeuvre. But my emphasis is largely on Sexus as an individual work and on the years 1940–1949, when Miller drafted and revised it. This study is built largely from archival materials: notes, lists, sketches, outlines, schemas, corrected typescripts—documents that shed light on Miller’s path from first ideas to finished work. Positioned at the intersection of genetic criticism and biography, this study seeks to capture Miller in the act of writing. Part One lays the groundwork for subsequent chapters by assembling and describing a genetic dossier of documents related to The Rosy Crucifixion. Part Two uses those documents to reconstruct the planning, composition, and revision history of Sexus. I show how, at each stage of the book’s unfolding, a new balance emerged between the programmatic and improvisational strands of Miller’s writing practice, giving the first installment of the trilogy its distinctive form. The result is the first sustained account of Miller’s creative process—one that redefines Sexus not as a falling off but as the foundation of his late career.