Among the vintage classics of W. Somerset Maugham, The Razor’s Edge, possesses multiple sparks of the author’s style of writing. The charm with which Somerset Maugham has written the plot, lends gravity and beauty to the book. Here, “Larry Darrell is a young American in search of the absolute. The progress of his spiritual odyssey involves him with some of Maugham’s most brilliant characters – his fiancée Isabel, whose choice between love and wealth has life long repercussions, and Elliott Templeton, her uncle, a classic expatriate snob. The most ambitious of Maugham’s novels, this is also one in which Maugham himself plays a part, as he wanders in and out of the story, observing his characters struggling with their fates”.

As is with all writers of solidity, Maugham can mould his readers to feel like his own characters. The readers can easily see themselves as: Larry Darrell, Isabel, Elliott Templeton, and even Maugham himself – in many parts of the novel.

Other works by W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) are in the forms of novels, collected short stories, travel writing, literary criticism. The first of his master pieces, Of Human Bondage was published in 1915, to be followed with continuous success.

Geeta Chhabra