Bøker av W. Somerset Maugham

Eclectic and illuminating, these essays are the last that Maugham published. Ranging from an appreciation of Goethe's novels, to an encounter with an Indian holy man, with a considered analysis of the form at which Maugham himself excelled - the short story - they present the enduring views and opinions of this eminent writer.

Somerset Maugham is the acknowledged master of the short story, and his full range is represented in this collection.

Down among the drab slums of Lambeth, eighteen-year-old Liza is the darling of Vere Street. But then Liza meets Jim Blakeston, charming and worldy, new to the area, and married. Soon the streets are wise to their passionate affair and Liza's fall from grace is fast and fatal.

Charles Strickland, a conventional stockbroker, abandons his wife and children for Paris and Tahiti, to live his life as a painter. Inspired by the life of Paul Gauguin, The Moon and Sixpence is at once a satiric caricature of Edwardian conventions and a vivid portrayal of the mentality of a genius.

But, intelligent and sensual, she quickly becomes bored by her oppressively conventional life, and finds her love for her husband slipping away. Originally rejected by publishers, Mrs Craddock was first published only on condition that certain 'shocking' passages were removed.

Though W. Somerset Maugham was also famous for his novels and plays, it has been argued that in thethe short story he reached the pinnacle of his artwas his true métier. These expertly told tales, with their addictive plot twists and vividly drawn characters, are both galvanizing as literature and wonderfully entertaining. In the adventures of his alter ego Ashenden, a writer who (like Maugham himself) turned secret agent in World War I, as well as in stories set in such far-flung locales as South Pacific islands and colonial outposts in Southeast Asia, Maugham brings his characters vividly to life, and their humanity is more convincing for the author's merciless exposure of their flaws and failures. Whether the chasms of misunderstanding he plumbs are those between colonizers and natives, between a missionary and a prostitute, or between a poetry-writing woman and her uncomprehending husband, Maugham brilliantly displays his irony, his wit, and his genius in the art of storytelling.