The Collected Short Stories of W. Somerset Maugham, Vol. 3

I've only just discovered the wonders of W. Somerset Maugham. This was the first of his works that I have ever read, and it was an absolute pleasure. There are other reviewers on these pages who are more knowledgeable and better critics than I, so I am just going to tell you how much I enjoyed this particular compilation. Every story was a treasure. Every single character was so well drawn, that for the first time in a long time I found myself empathising with these people, loving them, hating them, lamenting for them and genuinely caring about what happened to them. Every story started off in a fairly prosaic, nondescript fashion. But every story had me hooked by at least the first page. Sometimes they unfolded as funny stories, other were tales about how an individual's world had changed catastrophically. I never got bored, and the writing was never predictable, Maugham always had a surprisingly poetical observation to make that would send me into raptures. This is truly a writer of sensitivity and talent. I can honestly say that I have been searching for a writer of this calibre for a long time. If you care anything at all about the amazing stories that ordinary, little people have, then read this book and Maugham's other works. He truly is a master.

As a master of the short story, W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) was the highest paid author in the 1930's. He was born in the British Embassy in Paris, on January 25, 1874. He wrote with a sense of irony and wit. Often, he would express a cynical attitude towards life and his love of traveling found its way into his writing. He didn't confine himself to one genre, but also wrote novels, essays and plays. His purpose was to entertain his readers, although you do learn the subtleties of human nature from many of his stories. His keen eye for the minute details of life is combined with his writing style in such away as to capture and keep your attention. It is said that due to becoming an orphan at the age of 10, he was shy and tended to be more of a passive observer rather than an active participant. This explains some of the detachment that you feel in various stories. "I have never pretended to be anything but a story teller. It has amused me to tell stories and I have told a great many. It is a misfortune for me that the telling of a story just for the sake of the story is not an activity that is in favor with the intelligentsia. In endeavor to bear my misfortunes with fortitude." (from Creatures of Circumstance, 1947) In this collection you will find stories that are filled with tales of the South Seas, Europe and America. They are concise and persuasive and evoke a time and place where you completely are absorbed into a story that often has a nice unforeseen twist right at the end. Either you are surprised, laughing, sad life took a certain turn, or very amused. My Favorite Stories in this Collection : The Vessel of Wrath: A tale of love between a missionary and a drunken reprobate that has a most surprising ending. It deals with how humans draw foregone conclusions and how people can change for the better. The Force of Circumstance: Story of almost unavoidable circumstances and deals with the emotions a woman feels when she finds out her husband has had children with a native woman in the village and seems to have neglected to inform her. The Colonel's Lady: A wife publishes her poetry without her husband's knowledge. He can't understand her or why everyone loves her writing. The reader might not understand him, but might understand his wife's need to express her creativity in her own way as obviously, he is not aware of that part of her life. The Round Dozen: Amusing and almost unavoidable ending. These are stories you can read when you have an hour here or there to read a few stories at a time. Some are short enough to be read in 15 minutes or less and are only a few pages long. I enjoyed the slightly longer ones as the character development intensifies and Maugham's powers of observation have time to play out to the full extent. An escape to another time and place. ~The Rebecca Review

The first of four volumes of the collected short stories of Somerset Maugham is a glimpse of what is to come. A fine, detached, subtle but always unsparing observer of human nature, Maugham tells us stories about human weakness with a humorous, at the same time cynical and compassionate tone. Maugham expects very little from humans, and so, when they do sublime and even heroic things, it is all the more suprising. Perhaps the contemporary word which can best describe his attitude towards his characters is "cool". We humans are a mix of perversion, weakness, solidarity and real goodness. Maugham knows. So he is always willing to forgive his characters, as long as they know that their actions will have irremediable consequences. Hard but touching, Maugham sees the world from afar, from the internal wisdom which lets him know that nothing is too bad and nothing is too good.The tales I liked the most are "Rain", about the unlikely relationship between a couple of puritan missionaries and a prostitute, "Before the party", about terrible marital secrets revealed right before an important party, and, above all, "The fall of Edward Barnard", simply a masterpiece of storytelling. First time I read it, I decided to become Edward Barnard myself. Go figure. Maugham's style is anything but experimental. He is not trying to find a voice: he has one and he's pretty much sure about its value. And he's right. The way he uses words is the exact measure of craftmanship: not one word is missing, not one is futile. Precision, concision, wisdom, irony and humanism: the best mix for a reading. After you finish this, you'll go to the other three volumes, little by little, enjoying every story.

W. Somerset Maugham in his always fascinating short stories explores such a variety of relational scenarios with "disinterested curiosity" as to leave this reader breathless with awe. His characters murder, suicide, go mad, con, spy and even (remember he was writing in the early part of the century) commit incest. No situation eludes or escapes him. His genius is to make it all sensible and plausible, even prosaic, a truth we all know. Unrivaled in breadth, depth, brevity, tightness of composition and humor. Not for the faint hearted.

For me, just "The Fall of Edward Barnard" is worth the price of the book. It's sort of an early version of "The Razor's Edge" set in in Tahiti. Maugham's writing at its best, and there's lots of that in this collection, draws you into a story so smoothly and (deceptively) easily that you don't even realize you're making the effort to read it. Yet hiding within the clarity of the prose are all the complexities of human emotions, motivations and behaviors that stay with you long after you've put down the book. Masterful stuff.