What Are You Going to Do About Alf?
by Henry Miller
Miller passes the hat for Alfred Perlès: a funny, urgent Paris appeal to buy his friend six months in Ibiza and the freedom to finish a novel.
- 1935
About Henry Miller
The story, briefly
Spoiler-freeWhat Are You Going to Do About Alf? is Henry Miller’s openly practical 1935 appeal on behalf of Alfred Perlès, his closest Paris friend and former Clichy flatmate. Addressed to “all and sundry,” the pamphlet asks readers for gifts—not loans—so that Perlès can spend six months in Ibiza and finish his novel Le Quatuor en Ré Majeur. The first edition was privately printed in Paris; revised or newly prefaced printings followed in Belgium in 1938, Berkeley in 1944, and London in 1971. It is friendship, promotion, and literary economics compressed into one small public letter.
The story, in more detail
Miller turns patronage into performance. He advertises Perlès’s talent, dramatizes the conditions preventing him from writing, and challenges the reader to convert admiration for literature into material aid. The comic directness does not disguise the real question underneath: who pays for the time in which books get made?
The pamphlet also belongs to the improvised support system around Miller’s Paris circle. Eduardo Sanchez and Michael Fraenkel helped finance the first printing, according to later scholarship. Bibliographic records distinguish the Paris first edition from later Belgian, Bern Porter, and Turret Books issues; they are versions of the same open letter.
Themes and analysis
The practical purpose of the appeal
Alf is Alfred Perlès, Miller’s friend and former housemate in Clichy. The proposed help is specific: give him time away from the demands of earning a living so that he can finish a novel. Miller asks for gifts rather than loans, making support a contribution to the work instead of a new debt.
The planned destination is Ibiza. The appeal documents the plan and Miller’s attempt to fund it; it should not by itself be treated as proof that Perlès completed the proposed stay or finished the manuscript there. An appeal and its outcome are different kinds of evidence.
Comic publicity for a friend
Miller makes the reader answerable to the title’s direct question. Admiring an artist at a distance is easy; providing food, money, or working time involves a decision. His boastful promotion of Perlès keeps the address comic while the material need remains real.
The letter also turns private loyalty into public authorship. Perlès is its beneficiary and subject, not a fictional character invented to demonstrate poverty. The friendship can be followed in a different mode in Joey, Miller’s later portrait, and in the more extensively fictionalized Quiet Days in Clichy.
A recurring problem, a repeatedly issued text
The Paris pamphlet of 1935 was followed by later printings with additional framing material. The successive issues show that Miller and his publishers continued to find value in the appeal beyond its immediate fundraising occasion.
The Plight of the Creative Artist in the United States of America later puts Miller himself in the position of requesting assistance. Read together, the two works reveal an enduring contradiction: writers defend independence while relying on networks of practical help. Neither makes the need for food and shelter disappear through declarations of artistic freedom.
Why we recommend it
Friendship as infrastructure
The pamphlet shows the Paris circle not as a legend but as people raising the money that made writing time possible.
A miniature Miller performance
Charm, exaggeration, urgency, and moral pressure all work together in a few pages.
What this book explores
The people in its pages
Alfred Perlès
The “Alf” of the title: Miller’s closest Paris friend, presented here as a gifted writer who needs six months free from wage work.
Timeline
1935
The open letter is privately printed in Paris to raise support for Perlès.
1938
A Belgian printing appears with a new foreword.
1944
Bern Porter issues a Berkeley printing with a new preface.
1971
Turret Books republishes the pamphlet in London.
Book editions
Paperback
- Paperback
- Privately printed
- 1935
Paperback
- Paperback
- Privately printed
- 1938
Paperback
- Paperback
- Bern Porter
- 1944
Paperback
- Paperback
- Turret Books
- 1971
Reader reviews
Readers may also like
Quiet Days in Clichy
The fictionalized record of Miller and Perlès sharing poverty, food, jokes, and rooms in Clichy.
Read our take
What Are You Going to Do About Alf?: frequently asked questions
Who is Alf?
Alfred Perlès, the Austrian-born writer who became Miller’s closest Paris friend and Clichy flatmate.
What is Miller asking readers to do?
Donate enough money to let Perlès live in Ibiza for six months while finishing Le Quatuor en Ré Majeur; Miller specifies that the money is a gift, not a loan.
When was the letter first published?
It was privately printed in Paris in 1935, with later printings in Belgium, Berkeley, and London.
If you like Henry Miller
Explore authors with a similar voice, perspective, and influence.
Louis-Ferdinand Céline
Miller's acknowledged master at making literature out of the gutter. Journey gave him permission; Cancer is what he did with it.
View author
Ezra Pound
Pound read Cancer and sent Miller a famously backhanded postcard. Both believed literature's job was to wake the reader by any means necessary.
View author
Simone de Beauvoir
French writer and philosopher whose novels, memoirs, and social analysis examined freedom, gender, responsibility, aging, and the material conditions that shape a life.
View author
References
References
The sources below include the primary text, editions, scholarship, archival materials, and other records that informed this page. They document What Are You Going to Do About Alf?, its publication, and its place in literary history.
1What Are You Going to Do About Alf?
EssaysHenry Miller, 1935Used forThe primary text represented by this page, used for descriptions of the work’s contents and for any quoted passages shown here.
2What Are You Going to Do About Alf? — first-edition lot record
Official recordChristie'sUsed forOfficial record used to verify names, dates, institutional details, or other factual information on this page.
3Material aid and literary friendship in Henry Miller's circle
WebsiteDurham UniversityUsed forWeb source consulted for documented facts and historical context presented on the What Are You Going to Do About Alf? page.
4Lost and Found: The Work of Bern Porter
Official recordThe Museum of Modern ArtUsed forOfficial record used to verify names, dates, institutional details, or other factual information on this page.
5Henry Miller: A Life
BiographyW. W. Norton, 1991Used forBiographical evidence used to verify chronology, relationships, and historical context connected to What Are You Going to Do About Alf?.
i
Why these sources are here
The primary text is the baseline reference for every book page. Additional references document publication history, interpretation, and historical context where that evidence is available.
Explore more resources