Vagrant Mood

by W. Somerset Maugham

The Vagrant Mood is a brilliantly varied and colourful collection of essays. From Kant to Raymond Chandler; from the legend of Zurbaran to the art of the detective story; from Burke to Augustus Hare, Maugham brings his inimitable mastery of the incisive character sketch to the genre of literary criticism.

Genres: Essays, Nonfiction, Literature, Classics, Books About Books, English Literature, Biography

250 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1952

About the author

William Somerset Maugham was born in Paris in 1874. He spoke French even before he spoke a word of English, a fact to which some critics attribute the purity of his style.

His parents died early and, after an unhappy boyhood, which he recorded poignantly in Of Human Bondage, Maugham became a qualified physician. But writing was his true vocation. For ten years before his first success, he almost literally starved while pouring out novels and plays.

Maugham wrote at a time when experimental modernist literature such as that of William Faulkner, Thomas Mann, James Joyce and Virginia Woolf was gaining increasing popularity and winning critical acclaim. In this context, his plain prose style was criticized as 'such a tissue of clichés' that one's wonder is finally aroused at the writer's ability to assemble so many and at his unfailing inability to put anything in an individual way.

During World War I, Maugham worked for the British Secret Service . He travelled all over the world, and made many visits to America. After World War II, Maugham made his home in south of France and continued to move between England and Nice till his death in 1965.

At the time of Maugham's birth, French law was such that all foreign boys born in France became liable for conscription. Thus, Maugham was born within the Embassy, legally recognized as UK territory.

Reviews

[Jan Rice]

Image available on Amazon. This is the first American edition, from 1953. The dust jacket was on my copy when I began reading but fell apart during the process.

Actually I've read only one 31-page essay from this book, "The Decline and Fall of the Detective Story." As I think it's the first of W. Somerset Maugham I've ever read, I decided to go on and review it.

I noticed the author writes with a dry, ironical sense of humor that reminds me of my uncle whose book this was. His tone, one of looking down his nose unselfconsciously at the other classes (as well as at himself and in fact at people in general), isn't up to today's PC demands. Although that tone was unremarkable in 1949 when the book was published, the author, born in 1874, could have possibly become somewhat curmudgeonly by then.

The "shocker," by which I think Maugham means what we would call the thriller, should not be confused with the detective story. The shocker is the descendant of boys' books of "derring-do." At around this point, Maugham implies that such books are fodder for the newly literate masses. Detective stories, on the other hand, are appropriate for everyone.

For him murder is the prime topic for the detective story. After the murder, suspicion is narrowed down until the clues reveal who did it. The motive, no matter what you think, is likely to boil down to money--and once caught the murderer pays the ultimate price. It seems that it was the case that, as late as the mid-twentieth century, all murderers were hanged, unless there were "extenuating circumstances," which I take to mean murder in a lesser degree.

The detective story, while simple, must be expertly managed. The reader must not see through to the correct answer too soon, and the writer of the story must "play fair," for example, not bringing in a culprit who isn't part of the story. The eventual culprit must not be too sympathetic, lest the reader be unable to tolerate seeing him caught, or to unsympathetic, lest the reader guess his guilt too early in the story, and so on.

Maugham credits Conan Doyle and his creation Sherlock Holmes with the popularity attained by the detective story, but he bemoans the trend begun by Sherlock toward making the detective into some sort odd duck, or the crime too outlandish--a result of writers having exhausted every possible kind of plot and background.

As a consequence of the material having been exhausted, the "hard-boiled" story arose as an alternative. In those sorts of story, the issue isn't so much to ferret out who done it. That may be obvious from the first. The new issue is the dark workings of power. The hero has to bring the perpetrator to justice in spite of a corrupt world that would grind up the bearer of truth. The detectives of pure deduction had become unbelievable, but the hard-boiled detectives are, once again, believable in their time.

But Maugham doesn't see who could possibly succeed Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. In his mind, therefore, even though such stories will continue to be written (and read by him, too), both the detective story of pure deduction and the story of the hard-boiled detective, are dead.

So, unless his tongue was in his cheek, it seems W. Somerset Maugham, writing in 1949, could not imagine new forms of the detective, or crime, genre--similar to those scientists who have thought all the great discoveries had already been made, or economists who believed, say, during the Great Depression of the 1930s, that technology had reached its limits and that there would be no more new inventions.

I was happy to make the acquaintance of W. Somerset Maugham, even at this relatively late point in his life. I noticed he said he used to be a novelist. I hope to come across him again earlier in his career.

[Shamim E. Haque · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting collection of essays. The one that I liked most is "Some Novelists I have Known", and the next best two essays are easily "Augustus" and "After Reading Burke". As a Maugham fan I tend to like everything he has written, and it is perhaps hard for me to provide an unbiased review; nevertheless I will try to be objective. Firstly it is a relatively less readable and rather difficult book of the Maugham oeuvre. Some of the essays may seem rather academic: "Zurbaran" and "Reflections on a Certain Book" have an academic overture, though not downright so. In "Augustus" Maugham pays tribute to Augustus Hare, a 19th century English travel guidebook writer and author, who befriended Maugham in his formative years, and helped him launch his career as a writer. In this essay Maugham paints a very interesting, often entertaining, but by and large rather sympathetic, portrait of Augustus Hare. A large part of the essay is devoted to the family of Augustus and his affinity with the aristocracy of the British establishment of his era. The vivid description of those 19th century years, especially the fin de siècle England in which Augustus passed his last days, are brilliant. In the opening pages of the essay is a very authentic description of the well heeled life of the English middle-classes during the late 1800s, and after an anecdote that captures the lifestyle of the 19th century English gentlefolk, Maugham informs us that "hundreds upon hundreds of houses belonging to persons who, without being rich, were well enough off to live in the great comfort which they looked upon as the way in which gentlefolk should live." This is the opening essay of the book, and I trust the reader will find the subject amusing and interesting. In "After Reading Burke" Maugham attempts to analyse the quality and power of Edmund Burke's writing. Inspired by William Hazlitt, who was a great admirer of Burke, Maugham sets out to find out (in this essay) what it was that made Burke's prose so arresting and enduring. A rather unflattering background of Burke is also provided, and Maugham somehow manages to show us that Burke the orator and Burke the statesman were two very different persons: the just and high-minded speeches that he delivered were not at all compatible to the corruptions that he often condoned, and it was only because while Burke was writing he was able to imagine himself as the righteous "high-minded man whom his friends loved and honored for his nobility of spirit, his greatness and his magnanimity" that he was able to write so well. Those who wish to improve their writing will be rather impressed by the astute analysis that Maugham does of Burke's style: his sense of punctuation, varying of the length of sentences, paragraphs, the influence of his oratory skills, etc. This is a brilliant essay, although it may seem rather insipid to a reader who is reading for recreation than erudition. Clearly the most entertaining and readable essay is "Some Novelists I have Known". Alike "After Reading Burke" this essay is also inspired by Hazlitt. Here Maugham claims that he did not have intimate relations with most of the authors who were contemporary to him, and suggests the difficulties involved in divulging to the reader reminisces concerning authors whom we know to be renowned and great. Notwithstanding this, Maugham treats us to very enjoyable accounts of his encounters with Henry James, H.G. Wells, Arnold Bennett, and Edith Wharton. I found his recollections concerning Arnold Bennett and Edith Wharton most enjoyable. Several insights into H.G. Wells were also quite amusing, and I was particularly surprised to find that according to Maugham "H.G. had strong sexual instincts and he said to me more than once that the need to satisfy these instincts had nothing to do with love. It was purely a physiological matter." Maugham's rather precarious interview with Edith Wharton closes this essay. Despite her erudition and success as an author, after a twenty minute conversation, Maugham finally dismisses Mrs. Wharton for being rather uninteresting. She held all the right opinions about all the right things, and was quite bent upon proving that nothing she liked or did could be construed as in 'bad taste'. Her infallibility piqued Maugham, and by deliberately making a faux pas he was able to extract from her a rather cold "no", which in Maugham's words- "Never has a monosyllable contained more frigid displeasure, more shocked disapproval nor more wounded surprise." Maugham boldly proclaims that she is not his cup of tea!

All the essays that are available within the two covers of Vagrant Mood are good; the ones discussed are, to my mind, outstanding. The other essays also have interesting observations, and moments of hilarity or amusement. If you have read Ten Novels and their Authors then you may find The Vagrant Mood less readable by comparison; but aside from that it is an excellent collection of essays, and proves that Maugham neither lacked erudition nor the solid gifts with which good essayists are endowed. He was certainly one of the most versatile authors of the last century.

[lise.charmel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mentre leggevo questa raccolta di 6 saggi di Maugham mi sono chiesta perché Adelphi avesse deciso di tradurre e pubblicare questo testo.
Ad esclusione del saggio sul poliziesco, ancora attuale pur dimostrando scarsa lungimiranza e l'ultimo su alcuni scrittori da lui personalmente conosciuti, si tratta di testi senza alcun interesse per il lettore italiano medio, in cui si parla di autori forse parte integrante del canone letterario inglese, ma totalmente sconosciuti da noi. Potrebbe fare eccezione il saggio su Kant, che però ho trovato cervellotico e verboso e quello su Zurbaran, ma immaginatevi di leggere di pittura senza poter guardare le opere. Certamente noi ora possiamo navigare in Internet e cercarle, ma immaginate i suoi contemporanei...
E' pur vero che qua e là si trovano osservazioni brillanti, purtroppo annegate in un mare di contenuti di nessun interesse.
Lo consiglio solo agli amanti dell'autore che hanno già letto tutta la sua produzione di fiction, astenersi tutti gli altri.

[Dave · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like Maugham because he is easy to read - he is (or portrays himself as) intimate and plain, and makes you feel like you're in the company of someone friendly. I know that's what drew me in, and if sometimes he seems to be working too hard to sand everything smooth, I can usually enjoy his quiet examinations of extreme people and places, like Ashenden and "Rain" or "The Letter."

The best thing in this book of essays is "Some Novelists I Have Known," which has devastating portraits of Henry James (his literary opposite) and Edith Wharton, and rather more fair-minded pictures of H.G. Wells and Arnold Bennett. It's more breezy and alive (and pointed) than some of the other essays, which sometimes seem like Maugham translating other writings into his own idiom--still interesting, but less memorable. The essay on detective stories is OK; but, knowing a little bit more about those than the subjects of the other essays (Kant, Edmund Burke), I found that he oversimplified and smoothed too much. Overall, he's much better when he's talking about places and people he knows or knew.

[Annabelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

3 1/2 stars, really. Only Goodreads doesn’t do half stars.

The clincher comes at the end, where Maugham pokes a royally backhanded compliment to Edith Wharton. But Somerset Maugham could write about a rock, and I'd still probably read it, because he will manage to make it interesting. 3 out of the six essays here might as well have started out as rocks to me, but I'm so much the richer for having read about the lives of Augustus Hare, Francisco Zurbaran, and Edmund Burke. On paper and perhaps in real life, the blandest character here would have to be Augustus Hare. But Maugham's sketch on him proved most interesting to me. Because Hare was quite the character and social butterfly, I can't help wondering if he was instrumental in getting Maugham a leg up, socially. Surely Hare was the prototype for some of Maugham's first-person narrators, and Hare's European environs and privileged crowd the inspiration for the opulent settings and well-heeled characters in so many of Maugham's short stories?

[Simona Moschini · Rating 3 out of 5]

Raccolta di saggi di Maugham su:
- Augustus Hare, quel che si potrebbe definire un eminente vittoriano (interessante come ritratto psicologico e soprattutto come descrizione dei costumi vittoriani).
- Il pittore barocco Francisco de Zurbarán (dove Maugham sottolinea come la sensibilità contemporanea ne apprezzi le nature morte al posto dei generi pittorici apprezzati in vita dell'artista.)
- "Declino e caduta del genere poliziesco" è apprezzabile nelle critiche che muove al genere. Nel suo distinguere, però, i gialli in base al tipo di detective (poliziotto, dilettante e investigatore privato) e ritenere probabile, dopo Hammett e Marlowe, la morte per estenuazione del genere, Maugham pecca di scarsa immaginazione. Probabile che non abbia mai letto Dürrenmatt, né tantomeno, morendo nel 1965, poteva prevedere gli esiti alla Ellroy, che pure erano consequenziali all'hard boiled, e la chiusura del cerchio: quando il massimo della corruzione risiede proprio nelle istituzioni.
- "Dopo aver letto Burke", noioso excursus sullo stile di Edmund Burke e di altri inglesi del Settecento.
- "Riflessioni su un certo libro" si rivela nientemeno che un mini-saggio sulla vita di Kant e sulla "Critica del giudizio". Interessante.
- infine "Alcuni romanzieri che ho conosciuto" tratteggia ritratti bonari e, qua e là, brillanti nati dai ricordi personali su Henry James, H.G. Wells, Edith Warthon, Arnold Bennett e Elizabeth von Arnim, che lui chiama Russell in virtù del secondo matrimonio. Inutile precisare che le due donne sono quelle trattate con più perfidia.

Nel complesso: abbastanza brillanti ma meglio il Maugham romanziere.

[1.1 · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great little book of criticism complete with biographical sketches of the persons involved. The esssay about Augustus Hare starts a bit stuffily but becomes quite involving and detailed. The essay on Zurbaran is thoughtful and contains some very apt statements on aesthetics. The aesthetic considerations are later continued in 'Reflections on a Certain Book', about Kant's Critique of the Power of Judgment. Kant valued music least of all arts, apparently, and Maugham asserts he was "entirely devoid of aesthetic sensibility".

'The Decline and Fall of the Detective Story' is well focused but wide-ranging. I think Maugham was wrong in his conclusions but he wouldn't have known the general path of fiction (though he was right about much of his contemporary mystery fiction disappearing from the public mind). 'After Reading Burke' might have been my favorite essay in this collection: it's a great rumination on style and language.

'Some Novelists I have Known' was a great note to end on, I found it quite engaging and made me feel as if I must read The Old Wives' Tale and taught me more about H. G. Wells than I'd ever known before. The world of novelists is a funny one, and Maugham ends it on the perfect note, by reminsicing about a snub from Edith Wharton. I did grin a little as I closed the book, put a thermos of tea into my backpack, and wandered deeper into the city.

[Louis · Rating 4 out of 5]

A collection of commentaries on an eclectic range of subjects, ranging from Emanuel Kant to the lesser known Spanish painter Zurbaran. Not everything were on the same level of interest to me, the essays I enjoyed most were Augustus, The Decline and Fall of the Detective Story and his reflections on Edmund Burke. His reflections on a good detective story were particularly interesting. Of less interest were Zurbaran and the final piece, Some novelists I have known.

Somerset Maugham puts forth his remarks and onions in a lucid and logical manner. He writes writes beautiful English, these essays were a pleasure to read.

[Kristi A]

Eesti keeles “Uitmõtted”. Maughami austajatele, kellele kirjaniku arvamus korda läheb. Saab aimu isiklikest seikadest aegumatute kuulsuste elust ja isiksusest. Nähtamatust nähtavaks ja häirimatust kohati isegi häirivaks. Vürtsitatuks osutusid 19. sajandi kirjanik-kunstnik August Hare, 17. sajandi Hispaania kunstnik Francesco de Zurbarani, 18. sajandi Iiri poliitik, majandusteadlane ja filosoof Edmund Burke, 18. sajandi Saksa filosoof Immanuel Kant ning Maughami kaasaegsed romaanikirjanikud Henry James, Herbert G. Wells, Arnild Bennett jt. Lugesin huviga.

[Liedzeit Liedzeit · Rating 4 out of 5]

Six essays from the man with the fine mind. Some are quite obscure like the one about Augustus Hare. I never heard of Zurbaran before, but now I am really curious. He talks about Burke and Kant and the Detective novel. The best is the piece Some novelists I have known where he has something to say about Bennett and Wells.

[Mary Lee · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting collection of short essays. His comments about detective novels are hilarious. The descriptions of contemporary authors are amusing. I most enjoyed his thoughts on aesthetics. Short, easy read and well worth the time.

[Lise · Rating 2 out of 5]

DNF because I found these essays a hard slog not particularly interesting.

[Will · Rating 4 out of 5]

From "Some Novelists I Have Known," on Elizabeth von Arnim, then Elizabeth Russell:

She was living with her second husband, Lord Russell, on Telegraph Hill. When she went into the kitchen one morning she found the cook gasping; she asked what was the matter, and the cook told her that she had just cut off the head of the chicken they were to have to for dinner that night, and then the headless chicken had laid an egg.
'Show it to me,' said Elizabeth.
She looked at it pensively for a moment and then said:
'Give it to his lordship for breakfast tomorrow.'
Next morning, sitting at the table opposite her husband, she watched him as he ate the boiled egg. When he had finished she asked him:
'Did you notice anything funny about that egg, Frank?'
'No,' he answered. 'Was there anything peculiar about it?'
'No, nothing,' she said, 'except that it was laid by a dead hen.'
He gave her a startled look, sprang to the window and vomited. With a demure smile she added to me:
'And d'you know, I don't believe he ever really loved me after that.'

[Lee Anne · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is a slim collection of essays about people and topics the modern reader will most likely never have heard of, or at least care about. Augustus Hare (who? exactly.); Zurbaran (the Spanish Caravaggio, according to Wikipedia); what makes a good detective novel (this one was actually pretty good); Edmund Burke (I'd heard of him, but...); Kant (don't care); and the final essay, "Some Novelists I Have Known," which wins points for being very catty about Henry James. Maugham's marvelous voice is still present throughout, but too much of it is taken up with deathly dull topics. At least it was under 200 pages.

[WaldenOgre · Rating 3 out of 5]

写美学谈哲学都不是毛姆的专长，所以此书的部分章节在我看来颇有些无趣。归根结底，毛姆最擅长的还是写人，因为这才是他那条毒舌真正的用武之地啊~

[Alex]

The Vagrant Mood: Six Essays (Vintage Classics) by Somerset Maugham (2001)