Cakes and Ale [Paperback] [Jan 01, 2000] Somerset Maugham

Literature & Fiction

Somerset, Maugham

Contemporary

VINTAGE (RAND)

Christmas Holiday

Literary

Pan Books

The Great War changed everything and the years following it were tumultuous - most of all for those who lived the war first-hand.  Maugham himself is a character in this novel of self-discovery and search for meaning, but the protagonist is a character named Larry.  Battered physically and spiritually by the war, Larry's physical wounds heal, but his spirit is changed almost beyond recognition.  He leaves his betrothed, the beautiful and devoted Isabel.  He studies philosophy and religion in Paris.  He lives as a monk.  He witnesses the exotic hardships of Spanish life.  All of life that he can find - from an Indian Ashrama to labor in a coal mine - becomes Larry's spiritual experiment as he spurns the comfort and privilege of the Roaring '20s.  Maugham's theme is the contrast of spiritual content between Larry and the growing materialism and sophistication of those he left behind - and the surprising irony of where both of those paths lead.

The Razor's Edge

Pocket

Andalusi : Sketches and Impressions

Creative Media Partners, Llc

Hero

General Books LLC

Great Stories of the South Seas The Pacific.  Mackintosh.  The Fall of Edward Barnard.  Red.  The Pool.  Honolulu.  Rain.  Envoi.

Trembling of a Leaf : Stories of the South Sea Islands

CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform

Merry-Go-round

Orientations

"Orientations" has cleverness both in conception and expression that puts it at once in the category of "books to be asked for," and the occasional touches of humor and satire make the contents all the more piquant reading.   Spanish all over, both ethically and socially, is the tale called, "The Punctiliousness of Don Sebastian," and one seems to see the town of Xiormones, where only two trains stop in the course of the day, and they within three hours of each other. Anyone who attempts nowadays to put the precepts of the Gospel into literal execution, as Mr. Clinton did in "A Bad Example," must expect to bring the house about his ears; but the amusing thing is that not only wife and doctor, but the clergyman set him down for a madman. From his minister, at least, Mr. Clinton might have looked for sympathy.   How difficult, indeed impossible, it is to prevent a Platonic friendship from drifting into love when the parties are young and sympathetic, is seen in "De Amicitia." Relying upon her American training, Valentia thought it the most natural thing possible to take Ferdinand with her on her sketching tour in Holland, and it is characteristic of the Englishman that of the two he alone raised objections. Of course, before they had been three weeks at Monnickendam, they were "head and ears over!"  "Faith," although distressing, preaches unconsciously a lesson of charity.  Despite occasional bathos, "The Choice of Amyntas" is exquisitely fanciful and,  comes near to suggesting Voltaire or even Disraeli. The last story, "Daisy." is dramatic, cruelly cynical if you will, and terribly convincing.  W. Somerset Maugham was evidently proud of his versatility, for each story is conspicuous by its difference from the others in style, coloring, purpose, and effect. Moreover, in each of them we defy anyone to foresee what is coming, for their author is a master of the unexpected.  —The publishers of this edition...

"  It was the first Saturday afternoon in August; it had been broiling hot all day, with a cloudless sky, and the sun had been beating down on the houses, so that the top rooms were like ovens; but now with the approach of evening it was cooler, and everyone in Vere Street was out of doors.   Vere street, Lambeth, is a short, straight street leading out of the Westminster Bridge Road; it has forty houses on one side and forty houses on the other, and these eighty houses are very much more like one another than ever peas are like peas, or young ladies like young ladies. They are newish, three-storied buildings of dingy grey brick with slate roofs, and they are perfectly flat, without a bow-window or even a projecting cornice or window-sill to break the straightness of the line from one end of the street to the other.   This Saturday afternoon the street was full of life; no traffic came down Vere Street, and the cemented space between the pavements was given up to children. [...]"

Liza of Lambeth

A story of the proud Allertons whose fortune has been squandered, and whose three-hundred-year estate Hamlyn’s Purlieu stands to be lost to the family. Lucy and George Allerton, brother and sister, are resolved to overcome the mistakes of their father, Fred Allerton. A powerful exploration of relationships and familial bonds by a true master of the human psyche.

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