This article was most recently revised and updated by, https://www.britannica.com/biography/W-Somerset-Maugham, Spartacus Educational - Biography of William Somerset Maugham, W. Somerset Maugham - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up). Contents. Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students. Born in Paris, where he spent his first ten years, Maugham was schooled in England and went to a German university. "Mr Somerset Maugham's Library for School", Lyttelton and Hart-Davis (1984), pp. He was among the most popular writers of his era and reputedly the highest-paid author during the 1930s. [126] His works sold prodigiously throughout the English-speaking world. "The Razor's Edge," which would be his last important work, was published in 1944. If you like W. Somerset Maugham, you might also like: E.M. Forster, D.H. Lawrence, and John Fowles. He was plump rather than stout. 1 Childhood and education; 2 Career. [196][n 18] Even an admirer such as Evelyn Waugh felt that Maugham's disciplined writing with its "brilliant technical dexterity" was not without disadvantages: Maugham himself, although he never used the terms "second rate" or "mediocre" about his work,[199][n 19] was modest about his status. [46] Lifelong, Maugham was highly reticent about homosexual encounters, but it was thought by at least two of his lovers that at this period in his life he had recourse to young male prostitutes. [69] She returned to England and he continued with his work as a secret agent. [76], After the war Maugham had to choose between living in Britain or being with Haxton, because the latter was refused admission to the country. [24] His uncle ruled out the civil service, believing that it was no longer a career for gentlemen after reforms requiring applicants to pass an entrance examination. [180] Titles were altered to avoid association with stage plays held to be sensational: Rain became Sadie Thompson and The Constant Wife became Charming Sinners. This happens in the end to most dramatists, and they are wise to accept the warning. [87] His longest-running play of the decade, and of his whole career, was Our Betters. W. Somerset Maugham, in full William Somerset Maugham, (born Jan. 25, 1874, Paris, Francedied Dec. 16, 1965, Nice), English novelist, playwright, and short-story writer whose work is characterized by a clear unadorned style, cosmopolitan settings, and a shrewd understanding of human nature. He became a father and husband, marrying Syrie Wellcome in 1917, three years into an affair that produced their daughter, Liza. . He qualified as a doctor in 1897, but pursued his passion for writing following the publication of his . Publisher: Franklin Classics. Download Pdf. [56] The New York World described the romantic obsession of the protagonist as "the sentimental servitude of a poor fool". His fellow author Cyril Connolly wrote, "there will remain a story-teller's world from Singapore to the Marquesas that is exclusively and forever Maugham". W. Somerset Maugham, in full William Somerset Maugham, (born Jan. 25, 1874, Paris, Francedied Dec. 16, 1965, Nice), English novelist, playwright, and short-story writer whose work is characterized by a clear unadorned style, cosmopolitan settings, and a shrewd understanding of human nature. It is the kind of book that an author can only write once. [1] Maugham trained as a medical doctor at St. Thomas's hospital's medical school, London, but then decided to become a full-time writer. In addition, Carey has a. In The Summing Up (1938) and A Writers Notebook (1949) Maugham explains his philosophy of life as a resigned atheism and a certain skepticism about the extent of mans innate goodness and intelligence; it is this that gives his work its astringent cynicism. [83], In Maugham's absence his wife found an occupation, becoming a sought-after interior designer. [n 17] He was a Commandeur of the Legion of Honour, and an honorary doctor of the universities of Oxford and Toulouse. His stories the first in the genre of spy fiction continued by Ian Fleming, John le Carr and many others[169] are based so closely on Maugham's experiences that it was not until ten years after the war ended that the security services permitted their publication. After a year at Heidelberg, he entered St. Thomas medical school, London, and qualified as a doctor in 1897. [150] Unlike many of Maugham's later novels it has an unequivocally tragic ending. [170] In the 1928 volume Ashenden features in sixteen stories; two years later he reappeared, in his peacetime role of writer, as the narrator of Cakes and Ale. [31] The first print run sold out within three weeks and a reprint was quickly arranged. Though he wore nothing but an exiguous loincloth he looked neat, very clean and almost dapper. Antonyms for Somerset Maugham. Maugham also travelled far and wide to Europe, North America, the Far East, the South seas and beyond. By the early 1930s Maugham had grown tired of the theatre. 227228; Mander and Mitchenson, p. 204; and Lyttelton and Hart-Davis (1978), p. 195. Somerset Maugham (1874 -- 1965) grew to fit Brady's bill as a writer. [21] Brooks encouraged Maugham's ambitions to be a writer and introduced him to the works of Schopenhauer and Spinoza. This was Maugham's longest-running original play, but a dramatisation of his short story. William Somerset Maugham CH was an English playwright, novelist, and short story writer. Syrie Wellcome. He became a medical student in London and qualified as a physician in 1897. Maugham's British and American publishers issued and reissued various, sometimes overlapping, permutations during his lifetime and subsequently. MR. KNOW-ALL / Somerset Maugham () Bridging Text and Context: Write 80 - 100 words. As a result, he developed a talent for applying a wounding remark to those who displeased him. Maugham believed that "it is the impressions of a man's first twenty years which form him", and at the age of 53 - and extracted from his turbulent marriage to Syrie Wellcome - he had chosen to look back at his boyhood on the Kentish coast and at his early adulthood as a medical student in London. The first volume, Orientations, came out in 1898 and his last, Creatures of Circumstance, in 1947, with seven others between the two. [138] Raphael remarks about Maugham as a playwright, "His wit was sharp but rarely distressing; his plots abounded in amusing situations, his characters were usually drawn from the same class as his audiences and managed at once to satirize and delight their originals". [32] Maugham qualified as a physician the month after the publication of Liza of Lambeth but he immediately abandoned medicine and embarked on his 65-year career as a writer. Connon writes, "He was seen by some as a near saint and by others, particularly the Maugham family, as a villain";[5] Hastings labels him "a podgy Iago constantly briefing against [Syrie and Liza]", and quotes Alan Pryce-Jones's summary: "an intriguer, a schemer with a keen eye to his own advantage, a troublemaker". Born in Paris, where his father ran a law firm, he was orphaned by the age of ten and packed off to England, where his three older brothers were already. [73] He was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, a Fellow of the Library of Congress, Washington, an honorary member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and an honorary senator of Heidelberg University. In the US they spent time in Hollywood, which Maugham despised from the first, but found highly remunerative. [5] Maugham's father, Robert Ormond Maugham (18231884), was a prosperous solicitor, based in Paris;[6] his wife, Edith Mary, ne Snell, lived most of her life in France, where all the couple's children were born. Sources differ (see footnote 1) on whether Maugham died on 15 or 16 December, but it is generally agreed that to circumvent a law requiring autopsies in cases of death in hospital, he was taken by ambulance, shortly before or shortly after his death, to La Mauresque and it was announced that he had died there on 16 December. the son of a tailor, he dropped his aitches like one of the characters in, Winter and spring at the Mauresque, a few weeks of foreign travel (Austria, Italy, Spain) with a stay at a spa (, Maugham, the disbeliever in ecclesiastical ritual, was buried without ritual but on hallowed ground. [54], Maugham proofread Of Human Bondage at Malo-les-Bains, near Dunkirk, during a lull in his ambulance duties. 22. He thinks he's Somerset Maugham." At the height of his powers Maugham would have savoured the excruciating irony: the writer in decline, pumped up on sheep's cells, accused of impersonating . They visited the Far East together in 191920, keeping Maugham away from home for six months. Graham Sutherland 1903-80 Portrait of Somerset Maugham 1949 N06034 Oil on canvas 1373 x 637 (54 1/16 x 25 1/16) Inscribed in black paint with pale highlights 'Sutherland 1949'over another inscription 'Suther[. His work was popular for his simple style of writing, as well as his sharp and accurate understanding and judgment of human nature. Item Width: 156mm. [178], Radio and television adaptations have, in general, been more faithful to Maugham's original stories. Actually it has extremely complicated things to say about them, but its most important message may be that actions have real consequences, no matter how casually those actions may be taken". Check out our w. somerset maugham selection for the very best in unique or custom, handmade pieces from our literary fiction shops. He found his uncle and aunt well-meaning but remote by contrast with the loving warmth of his home in Paris; he became shy and developed a stammer that stayed with him all his life. [n 10] When the Second World War began in 1939 he stayed in his home as long as he could, but in June 1940 France surrendered; knowing himself to be proscribed by the Nazis (Goebbels denounced him personally) Maugham made his way to England in uncomfortable conditions on a coal freighter from Nice. [78] He spent much time travelling with Haxton. 1965. William Somerset Maugham is one of the best known English writers of the 20th century. [5], Shortly before the birth of the Maughams' fourth son the government of France proposed a new law under which all boys born on French soil to foreign parents would automatically be French citizens and liable to conscription for military service. [77] When in Britain, Maugham lived with his wife at their house in Marylebone, but the couple were temperamentally incompatible, and their relationship grew increasingly fractious. Corrections? [91] Hastings quotes a contemporary's view that Kear was Maugham's revenge on Walpole for "a stolen boyfriend, an unrequited love and an old canker of jealousy".[90]. [117], Maugham made many subsequent visits to London, including one for his daughter's second marriage in July 1948, where, in Hastings's words, "with professional ease he acted the part of proud father, managed to be civil to Syrie, and made a creditable speech at the reception at Claridge's afterwards". [154] He observed, "I am willing enough to agree with common opinion that Of Human Bondage is my best work. After one has got over the glamour of the stage and the excitement, I do not myself think the theatre has much to offer the writer compared with the other mediums in which he has complete independence and need consider no one. While he is roaming around the London street in a distressed mood he tries to buy . The adaptation was by John Colton and Clemence Randolph. Maugham is a British writer of great repute and has had one of the most successful literary careers in the twentieth century. "[98] He visited the Hindu sage Ramana Maharishi at his ashram, and later used him as the model for the spiritual guru of his 1944 novel The Razor's Edge. [160], The stories range from the short sketches of On a Chinese Screen, which he had written during his 1920 travels through China and Hong Kong, to many, mostly serious, short stories dealing with the lives of British and other colonial expatriates in the Pacific Islands and Asia. Maugham further damaged his own reputation by denying that another character, Alroy Kear a superficial novelist of more pushy ambition than literary talent was a caricature of Hugh Walpole. [171], Comic stories include "Jane" (1923), about a dowdy widow who reinvents herself as an outrageous and conspicuous society figure, to the consternation of her family;[172] "The Creative Impulse" (1926), in which a domineering authoress is shocked when her mild-mannered husband leaves her and sets up home with their cook;[172] and "The Three Fat Women of Antibes" (1933) in which three middle-aged friends play highly competitive bridge while attempting to slim, until reversals at the bridge table at the hands of an effortlessly slender fourth player provoke them into extravagantly breaking their diets. The critic John Sutherland says of it: According to some of Maugham's intimates, the main female character, the manipulative Mildred, was based on "a youth, probably a rent boy, with whom he became infatuated". Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. Sitter associated with 115 portraits. [65] He was reunited with Haxton, who joined him as secretary-companion. Peaches were not in season then. William Somerset Maugham (25 January 1874- 16 December 1965) was an English novelist, short story writer and playwright. The Evening Standard commented that there had not been so powerful a story of slum life since Rudyard Kipling's The Record of Badalia Herodsfoot (1890), and praised the author's "vividness and knowledge extraordinary gift of directness and concentration His characters have an astounding amount of vitality". 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