The Lessons Extracted from a Migraine

Culture Is there something to be said for enforced stillness? “I said I think that a guy who’s always interested in the condition of the world and changing it either has no problems of his own or refuses to face them,” said the novelist Henry Miller in a talking-head segment from Warren Beatty’s much-honored 1981 biopic of the Communist journalist John Reed, Reds. Although the film itself worked overtime to aggrandize its protagonist—he was, after all, played by Beatty, then in full command of his charm and screen presence—Miller did the opposite: The sly, devilish author of Tropic of Cancer, Tropic of Capricorn, and other once-scandalous novels was attempting to cut Reed down to size. To put it bluntly, Miller was making the case that those who become whipped up by causes—Reed was a cheer