He was a brilliant teller of tales, one of the most widely
read authors of the twentieth century, and at one time the most
famous writer in the world, yet W. Somerset Maugham’s own true
story has never been fully told. At last, the fascinating truth is
revealed in a landmark biography by the award-winning writer Selina
Hastings. Granted unprecedented access to Maugham’s personal
correspondence and to newly uncovered interviews with his only
child, Hastings portrays the secret loves, betrayals, integrity,
and passion that inspired Maugham to create such classics as The
Razor’s Edge and Of Human Bondage.
Hastings vividly presents Maugham’s lonely childhood spent
with unloving relatives after the death of his parents, a trauma
that resulted in shyness, a stammer, and for the rest of his life
an urgent need for physical tenderness. Here, too, are his adult
triumphs on the stage and page, works that allowed him a glittering
social life in which he befriended and sometimes fell out with such
luminaries as Dorothy Parker, Charlie Chaplin, D. H. Lawrence, and
Winston Churchill.
The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham portrays in full for the
first time Maugham’s disastrous marriage to Syrie Wellcome, a
manipulative society woman of dubious morality who trapped Maugham
with a pregnancy and an attempted suicide. Hastings also explores
Maugham’s many affairs with men, including his great love, Gerald
Haxton, an alcoholic charmer and a cad. Maugham’s courageous work
in secret intelligence during two world wars is described in
fascinating detail—experiences that provided the inspiration for
the groundbreaking Ashenden stories. From the West End to Broadway,
from China to the South Pacific, Maugham’s restless and remarkably
productive life is thrillingly recounted as Hastings uncovers the
real stories behind such classics as “Rain,” The Painted Veil,
Cakes & Ale, and other well-known tales.
An epic biography of a hugely talented and hugely conflicted
man, The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham is the definitive account
of Maugham’s extraordinary life.
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