THE SOUTHLAND by Henry Miller

The text „Southland“ by Henry Miller is indeed a very intense text dealing with the fundamental discrepancies between the South and the North of the U.S. originating from the American Civil War.
Henry Miller describes Southerners as being of a different culture having their own rhythms and attitude towards life. (Miller, p.1) But all Southerners have one thing in common – their sheer contempt for the North. Additionally, Miller uses metaphorical language to describe the South with its numerous cities and places of remembrance, i.e. Gettysburg, Vicksburg and Fredericksburg as places where “the horror of war assails [him] with desolating poignancy” (Miller, p. 2, left column) meaning that the South is still struggling with these historic but painful events in American history. Besides his metaphorical wordplays he pictures the socio-economic problems of the South using pathos in its most meaningful way – employing a variety of sensory descriptions characterizing this situation. Pointing out the large social gap “some you find living in the pomp and splendor….; some live like animals, in a condition comparable only to that of the primitive beings in Africa and other remote parts of the world…” (Miller, p.2 right column), he makes reference to slaves and slavery on which the white people imposed their notion of civilization.
As far as personal traits of character go, the Southerner is portrayed as “charming, gracious, courteous, dignified,” (Miller, p.2 right column) as opposed to the Northerner who is perceived as the seed of all evil.
In conclusion, I think that this text was very interesting to read as it contained many colorful expressions. However, I had to read the text multiple times and had to look up several words to fully grasp the whole idea of the text.