Of Human Bondage

I don't know if I have ever met with a character I felt more conflicting emotions about than Philip Carey. At times I wanted to cry for him, scream at him, loved his generosity, pitied his subjection to other people's prejudices, hated his self-absorption, hated his lack of self-control, and loved his perseverance. In fact, this range of emotional reaction is what made Philip real for me. Like everyone I have ever known he had so many facets and some that were so completely contradictory to one another.

In the end Maugham has woven a powerful, gripping story, full of questions about life itself, what makes it worthwhile and what purpose any man's life serves in the grand scheme of things. In the end, like the patterns on the Persian rug, show more perhaps it might be only about the beauty we are able to take from it individually.

Maugham is a serious writer who tackles large questions masterfully, but he is also a storyteller who can create characters with dimension and depth. Characters like Philip and Mildred (who is for me a despicable human being regardless of how sad her situation) will stay with you and make you think about and analyze them when the story is over, which is a hallmark of great writing for me. When I read a book like this one, I always wish I were still in a college lit course and could discuss this with the class.

Two more Maugham's sitting on my bookshelf and when they are done I will see how many more I can find. Maugham and Wharton are my 2015 treasures. show less

I've put off reading W. Somerset Maugham for a long time, for two rather idiosyncratic (and perhaps superficial) reasons. The first was my general unease around British 'society' novels, which appear deeply grounded in the mechanics of the class system (regardless of whether, on a case-by-case basis, this proves to be a fair suspicion or not). As a British working-class lad travelling through life on often unsteady socio-economic ground – "watch[ing] your life slide out of view," as Jarvis Cocker once put it – I'm instinctively opposed to the casual snobbery, petty conceit and idle condescension often present in upper-middle-class and aspirant middle-class novels in my country, whether written in 1815, 1915 or the present day (say show more hello, Sally Rooney). I'm not a class warrior; in fact, I often shy away from kitchen-sink material too. It's just not what I look for in my reading hobby. I look for either escapism or deep literary themes, and I don't find such things in repressed class-based stories. Such a characterisation would be unfair to pin on Maugham – whose book Of Human Bondage I promise I will soon begin to discuss – but the point I'm trying to make is that the titles which can be ring-fenced under this admittedly broad banner make me feel queasy, and I tend to avoid them entirely.

The second reason I had avoided Maugham was due to an arch put-down of the author by Christopher Hitchens, reproduced in Arguably, a collection of essays which was my first real exposure to Hitch. I'm aware that it is ridiculous to put too much stock in one man's opinion, particularly on something as subjective – or, more accurately, idiosyncratic – as literary taste, but Hitchens' writing was some of the first I read in my early twenties as I started to take my literary journey more seriously. That book, Arguably, prompted me to read Orwell, Nabokov, Hilary Mantel, the King James Bible and – for my which I am particularly grateful – the Flashman novels by George MacDonald Fraser. Suffice to say, I put great stock in Hitchens' opinions (and still do), and his dismissal of Maugham, however benign, was consequently hard to shift.

Now, having finally read Maugham's most well-known novel, Of Human Bondage, I have transferred my reticence onto this review. I review everything I read and prepare for what I will write, but I dread writing reviews when, even after finishing the book, I still don't know how I feel about it. Based on past experience, I know that I will usually figure something out as I write, but I also know this is usually hard work. But mostly, the sense of dread comes from this: I always find it hard to write a review which is one of admiration, but not love.

Certainly, it is much harder for me than it is for Maugham, who writes about love, admiration, infatuation – and plenty more besides – with a sometimes cringe-inducing alacrity. Of Human Bondage follows the life of Philip Carey (almost, but not entirely, an author avatar) from orphaned infanthood all the way to his early thirties, and casts an author's cool, appraising eye over family, youth, schooling, career, money, poverty, loves, infatuations, affairs, art, and everything else a young man is bruised by as he goes about establishing himself in the world. The reason Maugham chose Of Human Bondage as a title becomes clear: everything that goes into being human is bound within the pages of this book. It is not a novel you hold, but Philip himself.

This can become formidable to try to review. Maugham's book is rather quotable, but the following passage was one I was keen to note down as I was reading:

"… on the whole the impression was neither of tragedy nor of comedy. There was no describing it. It was manifold and various; there were tears and laughter, happiness and woe; it was tedious and interesting and indifferent; it was as you saw it: it was tumultuous and passionate; it was grave; it was sad and comic; it was trivial; it was simple and complex; joy was there and despair; the love of mothers for their children, and of men for women; lust trailed itself through the rooms with leaden feet, punishing the guilty and the innocent, helpless wives and wretched children; drink seized men and women and cost its inevitable price; death sighed in these rooms; and the beginning of life, filling some poor girl with terror and shame, was diagnosed there. There was neither good nor bad there. There were just facts. It was life." (pg. 462 – my emphasis)

In this passage, Maugham writes with more concision of the nature of his book than I could ever hope to do in this review. Consequently, I toss brevity to the side and say be damned to it, because it's worth taking the above passage as a prompt to further discussion. For one thing, take those words I emphasised – particularly the word 'diagnosed' – and the fact that the statement is a summary of Philip's time working in a hospital ward. Though Maugham's autobiographical element in Of Human Bondage is perhaps overstated (I was surprised how little his homosexuality influenced his writing here, even as a subtext), his medical background seems of great importance in his approach to the story. I have already said how this is not a novel you hold, but Philip himself, and certainly Maugham saw the experience as a purge. In his Foreword, Maugham writes of how he had been "obsessed by the teeming memories of my past life… they became such a burden to me, that I made up my mind there was only one way to be free of them and that was to write them all down on paper" (pg. 2). Maugham created a human body in words and then went about his diagnosis of its failings.

Another thing to mention is that the above lengthy passage from page 462 reminded me of Charles Dickens ("it was the best of times, it was the worst of times"). I was first reminded of Tolstoy in reading Of Human Bondage – the Russian count's War and Peace was a conscious attempt to incorporate "all of life" – but the comparison ultimately dissatisfied. Tolstoy was more literary; his book had a more regal air and was more explicitly concerned with themes – the lack of which perhaps explains why it still feels odd to approach Maugham's crowd-pleasing book with a literary appraisal. In contrast, the Dickens comparison sits well. Though there are differences between the two – Maugham has a surprising (and welcome) simplicity in his sentences, whereas Dickens was famously wordy – the two were, first and foremost, storytellers. Their strengths are in characterisation (all of Maugham's characters are excellently and compassionately drawn, even if they're only there for a single scene) and in pacing (absent any plot, Maugham's book is surprisingly engrossing for the entirety of its 700 pages). Their literary reputations developed through their success in storytelling rather than any conscious thematic questing.

There is a strange feeling which develops in a reader or reviewer when trying to assess a writer of this persuasion. In one respect, it is the lamentable (but entirely understandable) prejudice that if something is entertaining, it cannot be literary. This prejudice is wrongheaded, but difficult to surmount even for an honest admirer. And, as I wrote at the start of this review, admiration is harder for me to write about than love. I had a similar struggle with Larry McMurtry; I loved his book Lonesome Dove as entertainment, but I could also discern a literary merit. But, in contrast to more overtly literary novels, McMurtry's themes were a sort of all-pervading air, and rooted obscurely (but deeply) in his characters. I struggled to articulate it, and that was when I had love for the book; for Of Human Bondage, where there is only admiration, it is even harder.

Why admiration then, and not love? It's hard to say. In no small part, it must come down to personal preference. As I suggested at the start, I keep society novels rooted in class at arm's length and, perhaps, can never fully develop a love for one. But, moving beyond this, I also think it's in the nature of books of this type – the story- and character-driven literature of the likes of Dickens, Maugham and McMurtry – to defy literary review. Their strategy is to root their astute observations of life in their characters, rather than in structure or theme, which not only makes it damned hard to pull them out again for a review, but results in the story seeming misshapen – and lesser – when the pulling-apart is done. When I say books of this type defy review, it's not meant as an easy excuse, but rather a desire to avoid making them perishable. Putting a book whose strategy is in enjoyment and the magic of characters under a critical microscope is to subject them to something they were not designed for. It diminishes them, when surely the objective of a positive review is to commend.

Certainly, I found the most identifiable theme in Of Human Bondage – the Persian rug riddle – easy to understand and yet hard to align on a literary level. Within the story, it makes perfect sense, but it's something of a surprise to me now that I can write up my impressions of the story while scarcely mentioning it. I certainly don't feel obliged to make it the anchor of my review. In the broadest sense, it reflects within the story what I have tried to unpack in review. The book tries to establish a pattern – a narrative – among all the various things that can influence and bind a human life, and it is this which the Persian rug discussion in the book reflects.

A great virtue of this approach is that even aspects of the novel which appear to be flaws begin to be seen as advantages. When certain characters frustrate the reader – even Philip, the protagonist – this can be a sign of Maugham's effective characterisation. This is human life within the pages, and certainly there are frustrating characters in all our lives. Even with Mildred – the regular (and justified) target of a reader's hatred – you recognise that she is real. When she's there on the page, you don't feel like Maugham has let the story unravel with poor characterisation, as would be the case with a bad writer and a bad character. Rather, with her you feel you have to hold your tongue and endure, just as you do in real life whenever you see a friend, male or female, mooning over some classless slut or bluffing half-wit. Sometimes you hate Philip and sometimes you root for him. You are pulled every which way – and by following this in his narrative, Maugham shows you some of the powers and limiters which are in place over a human life.

This is not to say there aren't some drawbacks to the book. While some of Philip's earlier relationships are memorable (Miss Wilkinson, Miss Price), Maugham often had the advantage of me when he reintroduced or referred to characters I had not thought about for hundreds of pages. I would become muddled as to who the likes of Hayward or Clutton were, and thought perhaps there's a good reason Dickens chose monikers like Pumblechook and Magwitch over more non-descript names. I found Mildred's abrupt exit from the story dissatisfying, and while I enjoyed the happy ending more than others seem to have done, I was slightly perplexed by its ambiguity. I lacked the sense of momentousness that I usually feel when I finish a large literary tome.

I did, however, indeed see it as a happy ending. Philip, in being bound all his life by various forces and experiences, is now free. Having recognised he is free from obligation in the circumstances presented at the end, he chooses to be bound by them anyway. He wants human bondage, rather than romantic but uncertain wanderlust. In assessing the ending, we should recall something said much earlier by Cronshaw (who is also the one to present the Persian rug riddle):

"The illusion which man has that his will is free is so deeply rooted that I am ready to accept it. I act as though I were a free agent. But when an action is performed it is clear that all the forces of the universe from all eternity conspired to cause it, and nothing I could do could have prevented it." (pg. 238)

When it is delivered on page 238, this is merely an interesting philosophical discourse between Philip and Cronshaw. But by the end of the book, it has the weight of 700 pages behind it. Philip has lived thirty years of experience and decision, and has reached a point in the final pages where he feels free. And yet, it is clear to us that everything that has happened – all the forces of the universe, perhaps – has carried them there. Having grown in maturity, and overcome the terror of unemployment and poverty, he recognises the value of domestic security and contentment over restless dream-chasing and adventure. This is a bildungsroman, and Philip has now come of age.

Maugham, it seems, is often criticised for his lack of originality, and certainly, for most of the book the author appeared to be held back in this by the limitations of the bildungsroman format. After all, no young man, however lucid, has ever had a thought that had not already been thought by millions of young men before him. The book could appear, on the surface, to be a parlour game of characters – an almost superficial crowd-pleaser. But the way the story had been framed was key. Everything Philip has experienced in life influences his decision in the final pages. Just as that decision, added to the ranks of every previous decision, will influence the next one. A human life is an ongoing story. Here, the criticisms of Maugham's supposed lack of originality lose their thrust, because whilst from the outside a life can look just the same as any other life, when you are immersed in one – an individual life – you begin to see the small, accumulative things which direct it down one path or another. Every human life is original, if only by degrees.

Having overcome my reluctance to review Of Human Bondage, I now find myself in the contrary position of being reluctant to end the review. This is, by necessity, a very long novel and, to paraphrase Maugham, I am ashamed to make it longer by writing a review of it. But it is a book you can't be short about; to understand something with such scope you need to be immersed in it at length. "He did not know how wide a country, arid and precipitous, must be crossed before the traveller through life comes to an acceptance of reality" (pg. 135). Cronshaw tells us that the meaning of life is worthless unless you discover it yourself (pg. 237), and he expands on this with his Persian rug riddle. The preceding review is my attempt to discover it myself, using – as all literature should be used – the artist and his work as a lens.

Does it mean something that Mildred is the one to destroy Philip's Persian rug with a knife? Is it symbolic of her destructive relationship with Philip? I don't know; perhaps Maugham didn't even know. He only knew it made sense that she would – that it made sense for the characters to behave in this way within the context of their lives. That is the key to his success in Of Human Bondage. It is the strange effect of a literary writer seemingly unconcerned with literary affectation or convention, and yet being entirely conventional, accepting storytelling as the end in itself. After all, we use story to understand life. In a discussion on religion, one character argues the following:

"Perhaps religion is the best school of morality. It is like one of those drugs you gentlemen use in medicine which carries another in solution: it is of no efficacy in itself, but enables the other to be absorbed. You take your morality because it is combined with religion; you lost the religion and the morality stays behind. A man is more likely to be a good man if he has learned goodness through the love of God than through a perusal of Herbert Spencer." (pg. 497)

This is a statement as good as any on which to end this review. The statement comes from Athelny, not Philip, but we should remember the book is in large part directed by the influence various characters have on our protagonist. With its analogy, the statement recalls the medical diagnosis Maugham is making of his man. The author and protagonist share "the power of self-analysis", described as a "vice, as subtle as drug-taking" (pg. 273). And it is a vice at times; the book is often frustrating and sickening in the wretchedness of its characters. But the statement also hints at the entire purpose of the novel; in telling a story, the author teaches us something about life, and we are more likely to have a good read when the teachings are carried in the story. Of Human Bondage is a long book and difficult to appraise, but I can only conclude that Maugham got the dose right. show less

The title of W. Somerset Maugham’s novel has always seemed fraught to me. It seems even more so now. I wondered early on if it might be titillating but then I realized it was written at the end of the Victorian era, so little chance of that. It might have been an easier read if it was that kind of bondage. But there are many forms of bondage and this novel deals with the bondage of economics and gender and institutions in society. The novel portrays English society but women and poor in many parts of the world would probably see themselves in the story. With the destruction of the middle class in my country, it seems like 95% of us are sliding towards the type of life and bondage described by Maugham. But we’re not in a book, so show more maybe there is even less hope for a happy ending than the slim chance you would give for this book to end well.

Maybe this wasn’t a great choice for a pandemic read.

I disliked this novel often while I read it. By that I mean I was uncomfortable for a large percentage of my reading time. I was uncomfortable that so many people had to live with that kind uncertainty and scarcity of prospects and quiet desperation in their lives. While the protagonist Philip, whose life and prospects that the novel follows, made me uncomfortable and anxious for his individual future, the other characters, both major and minor, that were women, made me even more uncomfortable. It was like reading Dickens but without the ability to overlay the more comfortable and comic versions of Fagan that appear in the musicals and Disneyfied movies with the much darker character of the written Fagan. Or reading Les Misérables without being able ignore the social issues and turn it into a simple Broadway love story. It seemed so real. And that’s the mark of a great writer. I not only was a spectator uncomfortable with what was being described but it was visceral in the sense that I was feeling that what Philip was going through mimicked how I might feel in the same situations. I was uncomfortable because I see that uncertainty and scarcity in my world and society now in a way that could swallow up my kids or nephews and nieces. Or even me. And because I see that the uncertainty and scarcity is still worse for women than for men 100 years on from the novels setting.

Is it normal for a man reading a book written by a man about men in a men’s world to be most bothered by the fate of the women who are undeveloped, secondary characters? Maybe not. But my activism for women’s reproductive rights makes me sensitive, especially as there are several episodes in this book where a single woman’s inability to control her fertility dooms her while the man can just disappear. Or when it dooms a family that was already struggling to feed itself to potential disaster, as comes through in this passage:

"The people who dwelt here lived from hand to mouth. Babies were unwelcome, the man received them with surly anger, the mother with despair; it was one more mouth to feed, and there was little enough wherewith to fed those already there. Philip often discerned the wish that the child might be born dead or might die quickly."

The books resident philosopher, Cronshaw, hit on another resonance with today’s world when he says “My ancestors have lived in a civilised state so long that the fear of the police has eaten into my bones.”

The whole of what Philip is doing throughout the novel gets summed up philosophically at one point when he thinks:

"The thing then was to discover what one was and one’s system of philosophy would devise itself. It seemed to Philip that there were three things to find out: man’s relation to the world he lives in, man’s relation with the men among whom he lives, and finally man’s relation to himself."

Maybe the best thing about the novel is centering a protagonist with a disability, giving us a view into how it feels to live with disability on top of all the challenges that life and society throw our way. Philip’s clubfoot disability is mild compared to more debilitating and less treatable disabilities but probably more stigmatized than the stutter that Maugham himself experienced and used as a model for Philip’s disability.

Moving on to the experience of reading the novel in this particular fine press edition, I’ll start with maybe my favorite quote in the novel,

"I see you’re fond of books. You can always tell by the way people handle them."

I definitely resonated with Philip as a reader and lover of books. Early in the novel, as Maugham is developing his character, he writes:

"Insensibly he formed the most delightful habit in the world, the habit of reading: he did not know that thus he was providing himself with a refuge from all the distress of life; he did not know either that he was creating for himself an unreal world which would make the real world of every day a source of bitter disappointment."

One of the most delightful things about reading this Limited Editions Club edition was the cloth used for the binding. It is so soft and sensual to the touch that it was a delight to pick up and hold each time I read. That’s especially astonishing in that the book is 82-years old. I did notice that the spine did not have that same tactile feel, as it has been exposed most of those years (my copy does not have the glassine wrapper to protect it somewhat) and worn much smoother. So I suspect a combination of the slipcase doing its job and that the book has probably not been handled much or read before may be a prime factor in how amazing the book cloth feels. In his Monthly Letter dated February 1938, Number 105, Macy states that the cloth is an English Linen that was especially imported for the edition and that he had never seen before. He calls it coarse linen but that is not a word I would use to describe the way it feels.

The book was designed by Carl Rollins at The Printing-Office of the Yale University Press. I really liked the fact that the book was separated into two volumes to make it more comfortable to read and handle with the care of a book lover. Again in his letter, Macy states that the 6” x 9 1/8” size chosen for the book “always gives tactile pleasure when held in the hands.” The book is indeed easy and comfortable to read and the contact with that cover linen extraordinary.

I get the impression Macy didn’t love Bembo and thinks that Rollins chose it simply because Yale University Press was one of the few American presses to have it at the time. I found it very readable and an elegant companion to the delightful illuminated Old Caslon capitals at the beginning of each chapter. And even more elegant with the lined texture of the custom-made rag paper from Special Worthy Paper Company.

Given the length of this novel, I doubt we will ever see a better edition than the LEC. There are too few presses doing lengthy texts like this. You might want to search a copy out.

[Excursus on slip-cases] I’ve always been baffled by the negative view of slipcases held by many bookish folk. I even talked to a binder who viewed them as destructive due to the friction of inserting and removing the book, even in the correctly sized ones that they made (They recommended clamshell boxes, which I agree are better from the perspective they were coming from). I love them, especially if they are labeled so I can store my books spine inward to prevent fading. But the main reason I love them is illustrated here perfectly. The damage they absorb protects the book. My slipcase is in pieces after 82 years of doing its job. But the books are practically perfect except for some fading and loss of softness to the spine. Well done. I hope to learn to make slipcases, or have one made, so I can give the books another century of protection. Hopefully I’ll even be able to salvage the slipcase label…

AVAILABILITY: 1500 copies printed at the Yale University Press in 1938. As of this writing, I saw 28 copies on-line from about $600 to $100.

This review with photos of the book can be viewed at www.thewholebookexperience.com show less

Follows the life of Philip Carey from the time of his mother's death when he was very young into his early 30s, which see him settling into life as a doctor. It's a journey through Philip's early life experiences and travels, and also through his intellectual and emotional coming-of-age. Normally I'm not excited by novels that spend too much time in a character's headspace, but I love Philip to bits and enjoyed spending time with his thoughts and feelings. He makes some downright stupid decisions here and there, but Maugham writes his story in such a way that I didn't get too irritated with those choices and instead rooted for Philip the whole way. The plot is engaging and interesting, and the forays into Deep Thoughts are spaced well show more enough throughout and very well written so that I didn't get restless with them. This is my first Maugham, but I doubt it will be my last. Very much worth the 600+ pages, this. show less

This was a tough read. It took me well over 2 months to finish it, not so much because of the length but moreso because I kept wanting to slap Philip and tell him to grow the hell up!!! The (far too numerous) scenes with Mildred were worse than fingernails on chalkboard. I honestly believe that Maugham could have gotten the point across without shoving Mildred in our face SO MUCH!! Once Mildred was more or less out of the picture, I read the rest of the book in one sitting. I didn't hate Philip by the end of the book (which was NOT a given), but I did find him very very tedious. If it hadn't been for the Athelny family, I'm not sure that I could have finished it. There were moments of brilliance in describing love, hate, art and the show more human condition, but I vehemently disagree that it was a masterpiece. I honestly wish I hadn't bothered to read it. show less

Could this book have been a little bit shorter and been just as effective? At 684 pages, of course. Yet I am so glad I stayed with it.

I nearly did otherwise. Midway, it felt like nothing more than the story of a young man making one bad decision after another. And it was definitely that! Then came the philosophy.

"He could not be positive that reason was much help in the conduct of life. It seemed to him that life lived itself."

"He did not act with a part of himself but altogether. The power that possessed him seemed to have nothing to do with reason: all that reason did was to point out the methods of obtaining what his whole soul was striving for."

Philip Carey is orphaned young and lives a hard life. The story does not take some of show more the obvious turns that you think it might. Philip makes a brief stab at being a chartered accountant; tries to be an artist in Paris; then finds his groove as a medical student before falling into penury. He learns much along the way, finally (at page 590) finding a sense of meaning in the meaninglessness of life. "As the weaver elaborated his pattern for no end but the pleasure of his aesthetic sense, so might a man live his life, or if one was forced to believe that this actions were outside his choosing, so might a man look at his life, that it made a pattern." It's really a beautiful couple of pages that follow. show less

An orphaned boy goes through the trials of early life and into manhood at the turn of the 20th century in middle class England. A report from another time that reflects our own with its economic and societal pressures. There was also a glimpse of an earlier time (mid 19th century) that was still in view in 1900.
SM's characters were sympathetic and his philosophical insights into their lives, and ours, were thought provoking. How a novel with such little action and suspense could be so readable is a credit to SM. His sense of place, especially in Kent, touched upon an earlier England that was agrarian and livable. Carey's obsession with Mildred throughout his life made me want to punch the guy in the nose. His brush with poverty and his show more dealings with the lower classes gave a peak at other aspects of British life during the Empire's heyday. And the ending with Phillip's internal musings almost pushed this to a 5.
Will be reading more SM. show less