The stories and novels of Anaïs Nin are highly distinctive creations of a groundbreaking writer who helped to define a feminine tradition in literature. Daring and determined, she broke through the barriers of convention to address such themes as incest, homosexual desire, and erotic experimentation from a perspective of compassion and human development rather than of sensationalism. Informed by her readings of the major psychoanalytic thinkers, and with personal self-creation and transformation as her overarching theme, she struggled against the boundaries of formal conventions, especially those of realism and genre, seeking shapes and methods of expression that are essentially lyrical and nonlinear. Because her art is concerned with essences rather than surfaces, she sought to discover and employ techniques that would minimize dependence on abstraction and editorial narration. While she did not always succeed at this task, her best work sets a high standard, demanding and...