the hatches are closed down tight, logic runs rampant, with bloody cleaver flashing. There are many passages explicitly describing the narrator's sexual encounters. In 1978, literary scholar Donald Gutierrez argued that the sexual comedy in the book was "undeniably low... [but with] a stronger visceral appeal than high comedy". The characters are caricatures, and the male characters "stumbl[e] through the mazes of their conceptions of woman". Music and dance are other recurrent themes in the book. Music is used "as a sign of the flagging vitality Miller everywhere rejects". References to dancing include a comparison of loving Mona to a "dance of death", and a call for the reader to join in "a last expiring dance" even though "we are doomed". Characters Other than the first-person narrator "Henry Miller", the major characters include: Boris A friend who rents rooms at the Villa Borghese. The character was modeled after Michael Fraenkel, a writer who "had sheltered Miller during his hobo days" in 1930. Carl A writer friend who complains about optimistic people, about Paris, and about writing. Miller helps Carl write love letters to "the rich cunt, Irene", and Carl relates his encounter with her to Miller. Carl lives in squalor and has sex with a minor. The inspiration for Carl was Miller's friend Alfred Perlès, a writer. Collins A sailor who befriends Fillmore and Miller. As Collins had fallen in love with a boy in the past, his undressing a sick Miller to put him to bed has been interpreted as evidence of a homoerotic desire for Miller. Fillmore A "young man in the diplomatic service" who becomes friends with Miller. He invites Miller to stay with him; later the Russian "princess" Macha with "the clap" joins them. Fillmore and Miller disrupt a mass while hung over. Toward the end of the book, Fillmore promises to marry a French woman named Ginette who is pregnant by him, but she is physically abusive and controlling, and Miller convinces Fillmore to leave Paris without her. Fillmore's real-life counterpart was Richard Galen Osborn, a lawyer. Mona A character corresponding to Miller's estranged second wife June Miller. Miller remembers Mona, who is now in America, nostalgically. Tania A woman married to Sylvester. The character was modeled after Bertha Schrank, who was married to Joseph Schrank. It may also be noted that during the writing of the novel, Miller also had a passionate affair with