London: Mandarin, 1990 ISBN 0749303441 (many editions extant)
Somerset Maugham is a writer I've been meaning to get to for many years - now that I have I'm regretting that I didn't get to him sooner. Although it's probably unfair to them all, Maugham falls into my mental pool of English writers from the early-middle Twentieth Century that includes Evelyn Waugh, D.H. Lawrence, Virginia Woolf and others; a pool into which I haven't often dipped my toes, no doubt to my detriment.
Of human bondage is one of Maugham's earlier novels: a Bildungsroman, it follows the early life of Philip Carey, orphaned at an early age and sent to live with his uncle, a clergyman in a small village. Philip's uncle and aunt are childless, and have little inclination (on his uncle's part) or ability (on his aunt's) to show him the love and affection that he needs as a child. Philip is more than usually sensitive, owing to his club-foot. His sensitivity affects his school days, as he struggles to connect with the other children.
Philip has a small inheritance from his parents, and on leaving school - much to his uncle's disgust as he wished Philip to go to Oxford and take orders - goes to Germany, where he has his first inklings of passion and romance, and makes a friend who has an impression on his artistic sensibilities.
He is convinced to return to London to be articled to a firm of accountants. The one thing he learns from his sojourn in the firm is that such work is not for him. During this period of time he has a short affair with an older woman who is a friend of his uncle and aunt's. What he thinks is a bit of fun means much more than that to his lover, and her distraught reaction to his ending of the affair is Philip's first inkling of the pain that love can inflict.
Philip's time in Paris is wonderful - he's dropped into a new intellectual circle, and becomes used to discussing abstract subjects and the beauty of art with all the self-assurance of youth. One of the other students, Fanny Price, takes a shine to him. She is an appalling artist, but can't realise it herself, and is convinced that she can work herself to talent. Philip is shocked when, after she commits suicide, he realises that she loved him. Philip understands he doesn't have what it takes to be an artist, and moves back to England to begin to study medicine.
Soon, through a colleague, he meets the waitress Mildred. For reasons he can't understand, he falls completely in love with her. Mildred, for her part is a snobbish, avaricious vapid character, who in no way reciprocates Philip's love. However, she uses him terribly. Eventually she leaves with another man, Emil. Philip takes up with Norah, and finds himself very happy. Not too much later Mildred returns, pregnant, after Emil leaves her. She throws herself on Philip, who, seemingly unable to help himself, leaves Norah and looks after Mildred, until she disappears again, this time with Philip's best friend. Philip is broken by this, but tries to rebuild his life. He finds Mildred sometime later selling herself to make ends meet - he takes her and the baby in. Almost to his surprise he finds he no longer loves Mildred, but enjoys having the baby around. It is here that the reader finally gains an insight into Mildred: shallow and driven by her lusts and passions, she had always seen Philip as a fall-back option, and is stunned to find that he is no longer interested. With great malice, she destroys Philip's possessions and leaves his rooms.
Meanwhile Philip has made a disastrous bet on the Stock Exchange and finds himself penniless. In his shame at his situation, he can't bring himself to fall back on his friends. Fortunately one them, Thorpe Athelny, realises Philip's predicament, and takes him in despite being very poor himself, with a large family. The loving household of the Athelnys restores Philip's soul somewhat, and, with Thorpe's help, he finds a position in a large drapery store. He finds the work a drudge, even after his artistic talent is noticed and he becomes one of the designers of the dresses the firm makes.
On the death of Philip's uncle, Philip finally has enough money to go back to his medical studies, which he completes by working in the poorer parts of London and the countryside, which opens his eyes even more to the human condition. His friendship with Thorpe was based around a mutual love of art and over a period of time Philip had made a plan that, once graduated, he would travel the world and particularly Spain. As he nears graduation, he spends a month with the Athelnys picking hops in Kent, and has an affair with Susan, Thorpe's eldest daughter, who is a beautiful young woman in body and soul. When she thinks she might be pregnant, Philip is distraught that all his plans have gone awry yet again - but then has the epiphany that to marry Susan and settle down with her is actually the best thing he could do. So, when she lets him know that her pregnancy was a false alarm, he asks her to marry him.
The beauty of this work is no doubt the writing - the reader can feel that it was written by a younger man, who still felt the passions of youth strongly, but the writing is so facile, scenes are evoked so easily, that it sometimes feels it is written by a much more experienced writer. There is no doubt that Maugham was a great writer. Philip is a character that gradually becomes more self-aware as the novel progresses - his deformity makes it hard for him to accept that people didn't think less of him as a man, and is constantly surprised and humbled when he realises that people actually like him,.
Maugham's description of Philip's love for Mildred brings forth all the pain of unrequited love, from the loss of meaning to life to the myriad plans, disappointments and small victories that make such an affair damaging to a life and to a psyche. Philip is at least self-aware enough to realise his problem, and to also realise to some extent he was in the grip of something he couldn't control. Love as an emotion comes out of this book as something that only gives pain, and something mostly to be avoided.
Philip eventually develops, not so much a scorn for his fellow artist friends, but a realisation that, for himself anyway, art is subordinate to real life, and that the ebb and flow of the great sea of humanity is a more interesting study than how to capture an image on a canvas. Philip's effort to grasp at the meaning of life is evident from his schooldays onwards, and as he tests various theories and ways of living, he is inevitably disappointed. In the final pages of the book, Maugham writes "He thought of his desire to make a design, intricate and beautiful, out of the myriad, meaningless facts of life: had he not seen also that the simplest pattern, that in which a man was born, worked, married, had children, and died, was likewise the most perfect? It might be that to surrender to happiness was to accept defeat, but it was a defeat better than many victories."
Essentially this is the matter of the book - what is the best way to live? Is love something to be desired, or is simple happiness better? Does art matter? Does poverty matter as long as you can keep body and home together? (Maugham has no doubt that abject poverty is the worst of all circumstances) These are the larger questions at play in this book, and Maugham has dealt with them in a deceptively simple way.
I found Of human bondage compulsively readable. Highly recommended.
Cheers for now, from
A View Over the Bell
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