Joaquín Nin-Culmell
Her younger brother, a pianist and composer living in the same house. He disapproves of Henry Miller and refuses to meet their father.
To protect his mother without condemning his father.
The book
At a glance
- 'Joaquin' — her younger brother, a pianist and composer, named after their father
- Throughout; he lives in the same house
- Less of Henry Miller's world, and a return to Catholicism
- Joaquín Nin-Culmell · 1908–2004 · Berlin
Who they are in the book
Spoiler-freeJoaquín Nin-Culmell was Anaïs Nin's younger brother, a pianist and composer, named after the father who had left them. He lived in the house at Louveciennes with his sister and their mother, practised for hours at a stretch, and gave the concert at the Salle Chopin that brings most of the book's cast into one room.
He is the dissenting voice about the way she is living. He asks why the curtains and the shoes and the writing paper are all for Henry Miller, and what about him. He is overheard saying his sister is a dreamer with no sense of reality who mistakes what Miller shows her for the real thing. Later in the volume he is trying to bring her back to the comforts of Catholicism.
His own refusal is the harder one. When their father came back into their lives, Joaquín would not see him — out of loyalty to their mother, and, as he told her, without claiming any right to judge him.
How the book draws them
- The pianoHe plays continuously, and she writes that it is as if he meant to melt the walls of the house (page 12).
- The concertAt the Salle Chopin their father tries to receive the guests at the door as though he had sponsored the evening. Joaquín sends him a message: take your seat like everybody else, or be thrown out. It works, and it ruins the concert for him — he comes on pale and tense before he warms up and is wildly applauded (page 106).
- The capeDriving home from that concert, he covers his sister with his Spanish cape (page 107).
- The objection to Henry MillerWhy curtains for Henry, why shoes for Henry, why writing paper and books for Henry — and what about me. Nin cannot explain to him what she is getting back (page 68).
- What he says about herShe overhears him telling someone that Anaïs is a dreamer with no sense of reality, and that reality is what she thinks Henry Miller is revealing to her (page 76).
- The walk round the lakeShe asks him not to judge their father before he has met him, and tells him that judging their father means judging her, because the two of them are alike. He answers that the resemblances are only in details (pages 224–225).
- The refusalTheir mother writes to report what he said: that he will not see his father, that he prefers to sacrifice himself, that it is a double sacrifice because his father will think he is being condemned, and that he has no right to judge because tomorrow he might do the same or worse (page 250).