W. Somerset Maugham

The Magician (1909) is a novel by W. Somerset Maugham. Controversial for its portrayal of infidelity and occult ritual, The Magician was instrumental in establishing Maugham's reputation as a leading author of the late Victorian era. Inspired by stories of Aleister Crowley, an influential occultist and magician, Maugham crafted a masterpiece of fantasy fiction that would inspire Crowley himself to write a hit piece for Vanity Fair erroneously accusing...

Five years change a man, and when they have been spent in the bush fighting Boers, the changes are profound. So when Jamie Parson comes home with captain's pips and a Victoria Cross, he is no longer the boy he was. But not to his parents and Mary, his sweetheart...they expect him to fit in. Jamie can't, and shortly breaks off with Mary. Happiness remains a shadow, illusive as the Boers, and Jamie finds the moral struggle as relentless as the military....

THE Pacific is inconstant and uncertain like the soul of man. Sometimes it is grey like the English Channel off Beachy Head, with a heavy swell, and sometimes it is rough, capped with white crests, and boisterous. It is not so often that it is calm and blue. Then, indeed, the blue is arrogant. The sun shines fiercely from an unclouded sky. The trade wind gets into your blood and you are filled with an impatience for the unknown. The billows, magnificently...

English novelist, short story writer and playwright, William Somerset Maugham (1874-1965), achieved incredible success in the twentieth century with the reading public, despite a lackluster reception from literary critics. His simple and lucid style complemented his interesting and highly-developed characters, appealing to readers as much in the 1920's and 1930's as it does today. The works contained in this edition-The Pacific, Mackintosh, The Fall...

Author finds his identity and what is important in life through suffering defeat, and tragic love.

William Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) was an English playwright, novelist, and short story writer. He was one of the most popular authors of his era, and reputedly the highest paid of his profession during the 1930s. By 1914 he was famous, with 10 plays produced and 10 published novels. His masterpiece is generally agreed to be Of Human Bondage (1915), a semi-autobiographical novel that deals with the life of the main character Philip Carey, who like...

"Caesar's Wife A Comedy in Three Acts" is a play that combines romance, intrigue, and profound insight into the human condition? Fans of top-notch dramatic writing will appreciate W. Somerset Maugham's Caesar's Wife, which explores an unusual love triangle between a distinguished, older dignitary, his personal secretary, and his much-younger wife.

DeAmicitia is about an American art student and English poet living in Paris, and what transpires during their summer trip to Holland. The Punctiliousness of Don Sebastian tells the story behind the alabaster monument of Don Sebastian and his wife. Art Fiction is a literary genre in which art is not solely an object, but is a reflection of what is human in all of us. Other examples are: Girl with a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier Glimpses of...

A collection of six stories-including the acclaimed "The Outstation"-by the renowned twentieth-century author of the classic Of Human Bondage. Set in the Federated Malay States during the 1920s, these stories portray the lives of the English living abroad and the clashes that occur with the native Malaysians-and among themselves. In "Before the Party," a widow who lies about the cause of her husband's death in Borneo is confronted by her family...