W Somerset Maugham

WILLIAM SOMERSET MAUGHAM d1965. British playwright, novelist and short story writer. Despite a difficult childhood he rose to become one of the most popular writers of his era and reputedly the highest paid author of the 1930s. His most notable works include ; Of Human Bondage / The Letter / Rain and The Razors Edge. After losing both his parents by the age of 10, Maugham was raised by a paternal uncle who was emotionally cold. Not wanting to become an attorney like the other men in his family, he eventually trained and qualified as a doctor ; but the first run of his first novel, Liza of Lambeth (1897) sold out so rapidly that he gave up medicine to write full time. In later life his commercial success with high book sales, successful theatre productions and a string of film adaptations backed by astute stock market investments ; allowed him to live a very comfortable life. Yet despite many triumphs, he never attracted the highest respect from the critics or his peers. He attributed this to his lack of "lyrical quality", his small vocabulary and failure to make expert use of metaphor in his work. He died aged 91 in 1965