Of Human Bondage
W. Somerset Maugham
Not only was my mother self-educated; she played a major role in educating me. She gave me D.H. Lawrence to read and we discussed these books at length. But she also gave me Of Human Bondage; along with the book she told me about its author.
Maugham spoke with a severe stammer and could barely communicate. I am not nearly as afflicted as he was in terms of a speech impediment; however I do know how it feels to not be able to speak fluently. As the years have passed this mild speech anomaly has faded to a pinpoint; I’ve been doing public speaking and readings from my book and my speech hasn’t caused any problems. My poor mother; she suffered more from this situation than I did.
Maugham’s novel is autobiographical up to a point. In the book the main character, Phillip, has what used to be called a “club foot.” The book tells the story of Phillip’s life from toddler-hood to a mature man in his thirties. He is dogged by a sense of being different and not being able to play games with other boys.
The book feels naked. By this I mean that Maugham is revealing the very worst of his young life. Sometimes the reader becomes impatient when Phillip is so horribly depressed regarding Mildred, the love of his youth. Described as being almost ugly, with a cold temperament and poor manners, you want to shake him and tell him to pull his socks up and find a nice, kind, warm-hearted girl.
Maugham trained as a physician in London at St. Luke’s Hospital. He never completed his course because he knew he had to be a writer. So he did what lots of writers do: he wrote an initial first novel, thinly veiled as fiction but in fact was autobiographical. That piece of work done and put aside, the writer–in this case, Maugham–creates a new persona and his childhood/adolescent traumas are packed away between two covers of the first book. Maugham was considered the ultimate master of short stories and he wrote hundreds, all told by a mature man with a dry sense of humor. The “crippled” Phillip is gone forever, exorcised.
Yes, some of the book is sad but it is gripping in that you want to know “what happens next.” Of Human Bondage is full of characters that Maugham must have encountered along his way and he presents them as real people, in complete detail.
A book not to be taken lightly.
lgmwriting 