Books: California Laureate

SPLENDID POSEUR (310 pp.)—M. M. Marberry—CrowelI ($3.75).

Joaquin Miller's mother claimed that he had been born in a manger, but Joaquin himself always stoutly maintained that it was in "a covered wagon, pointed West." Both had escaped the fact: Joaquin (pronounced Wah-Keen) was actually, born in bed on a farm near Liberty, Ind. in 1837, and never climbed aboard a covered wagon till he was a strapping six-footer of 14. Nonetheless, it was a strangely modest yarn for Miller, who spent a lifetime stretching the truth about himself until it snapped. Famed on two...