Rating: 
Summary: Not enlightening but readable
Review: This book could have done with some more discussion of Larry's time in India. In fact, very little of the book has to do with that. Most of it has to do with a character being snubbed or accepted to parties. But it's still a good book and worth reading if you like the subject matter.
Rating: 
Summary: Dazzling bit of writing
Review: The Razor's Edge is an unusual amalgam -- three-quarters witty social commentary about American and European society, one-quarter Eastern philosophy -- bound together by Maugham's impeccable prose -- almost as though Henry James and Hermann Hesse had collaborated. The book contrasts the adventures of Larry, a seeker who travels widely in search of life's meaning, with that of his former fiancee, Isabelle, who sacrifices her love for Larry in favor of wealth and social standing. While the book is an odd literary chimera, the result is supremely satisfying. One gets to luxuriate in Maugham's biting descriptions of the social milieu in Paris, the Riviera, and London, while simultaneously being exposed to some much bigger issues presented in the context of Larry's intriguing quest for enlightenment. Along the way there is beauty, degradation, betrayal, forgiveness, art, fashion, turgid fascination with France's demimonde, and lots of other juicy material. A great read -- fun yet substantive -- like eating a fluffy eclair that actually has nutritional value!
Rating:
Summary: very good book, and well written, too
Review: As always with Maugham, the writing is superb, intelligent - this alone is a constant source of pleasure.
The story of the book, mainly a "bildungsroman" as the Germans call the genre (following the development of a character in the pursuit of Happiness), is typical of that genre. Quite well done although, to be frank, I think that (Hermann) Hesse has done the same thing but in a vastly more powerful way, in "Siddharta" for example (but also in "Narziss und Goldmund" and other books). With due respect to Maugham, his book was probably quiet advanced for the times, and Hesse had an easier time because the ideas he wanted to write about were much more accepted.
Anyway, all in all "The Razor's Edge" wins easily 4 stars - but not 5, no.
Rating:
Summary: Maugham and his genre at its best
Review: On reading the first three pages of this book i thought i was in for a long haul of upperclass victorian drama in drawing rooms and typical unrevolutionary writing, but i trudged through and all of a sudden the book takes on this fresh life, and the ideas and lifestyle expressed by the protagonist are simply breathtaking, and really life-changing. It is also a great social criticism of its time. The female characters are typically Maugham yet completely believable. I found this book to be incredibly entertaining and is the first book to change my life since reading the virgin suicides when i was 16. A fantastic exploration of the self and a bit of mysticism thrown in, just read it.
Rating:
Summary: Maugham's American liaison
Review: I think Maugham as a writer is most prominent as a miniaturist--he writes excellent scenes and episodes that coalesce into novels that, while not always greater than the sum of their parts, effectively crystallize different aspects of the human condition into lively collages. This is the case with "The Razor's Edge," which basically pertains to several fictionalized people with whom he hobnobbed while traveling around America and Europe between the World Wars and is narrated by the author himself in a relaxed, plainspoken voice.
Maugham introduces us to a circle of friends and acquaintances, most of whom are American, from various walks of life and levels of affluence. At the center is a wealthy Chicagoan named Elliott Templeton--Maugham calls him a snob because he holds fashionable dinners attended only by the social elite and excludes those outside his class, but in actuality he is very generous and considerate, a devoted convert to Catholicism, a man of whose life the moral could be the ultimate emptiness of glamor, as illustrated by his lonely death. Elliott's "sparkling and vivacious" niece Isabel is the feminine embodiment of the novel, an awkward girl who emerges as a graceful woman.
Through Elliott we meet Isabel's boyfriend Larry, an affable, sensitive young man who represents the kind of protagonist with whom Maugham seems to identify the most--the restless soul, the open mind, the seeker of wisdom. Having served as an aviator in the air corps during World War I and witnessed a friend die in valor, he is now idle and in no hurry to figure out what he wants to do with his life. To Isabel's chagrin, he is not much interested in making a lot of money; he loves learning and would rather spend his time expanding his horizons, seeing the world and experiencing all it has to offer.
While Larry is roaming the Orient finding himself, Isabel marries Gray, a very wealthy man until he is ruined in the New York stock market crash in 1929. The self-knowledge Larry brings back from India and uses to revive Gray's spirits could be considered the crux of the novel, even though Maugham--ostensibly to tantalize the reader--tries to downplay its importance. Larry also offers to marry the tragic Sophie, a wild American woman who has surrendered her life to alcohol, drugs, and promiscuity after her husband and child were killed in a car accident, but she refuses to be his "Mary Magdalen."
Far from the taciturn, self-pitying semi-autobiographical Philip Carey of "Of Human Bondage," the Maugham of "The Razor's Edge" is a confident and quietly amused cosmopolite who relishes his prestige as a famous author, a status that gives him a ticket to an echelon of society to which he knows he normally wouldn't be admitted. He is fascinated by people and the stories they have to tell, relating them in breezy prose that obeys its aesthetic limits; and, suffusing the novel with the mood that America is slowly but surely supplanting England as the most militarily and financially powerful country in the world, gives a nod across the ocean to a readership that welcomed his books heartily.
Rating:
Summary: Throughly enjoyable, and illuminating!
Review: The Razor's Edge is a tale of one man (Larry) who was born and brought up in US, spend many years in Europe, first flying aircrafts in WW I and later living an idiosyncratic existence where he searched for purpose and ambition through books, languages and labor. He later travels to India, and finds solace in the Hindu philosophy, where he also learns how to medidate and be at peace with oneself and the world. Maugham writes a very accurate and engaging account of Hinduism.
The novel explores the relationship of various people. The author as a part of story travels in and out of the life of Larry and his friends, and through several conversations that occur intermittenly recreates the story of Larry, Isabel, Gray, Elliot and Sophie. Isabel loves Larry, but Larry's insistance on choosing to loaf and search for the meaning of life and his purpose (and hence living a poor life) and marries Gray, the multimillionaire. Without divulging much details of the story, one can say that the author does a good job in making his characters real and interesting, and presents through them an array of human emotions.The Razor's edge is also a social commentary, and Maugham opens a window into the lifes and times of early twentieth century Upper classes, their constant striving for popularity and for materialistic pleasures, their hopes, and failings. The story is written in a sentiment and style that makes this discussion and critique on classes as invisible score playing somewhere in background. In modern context of the philosophy of science, as say Capra in his Tao of Physics points out, or read Complexity by Waldrop, Eastern and especially Indian ageold wisdom and philosophy resonantes with the new contexts and paradigms in science. The paradigms of having cycles of existence, of evolution and coevolution, of each and every action of every creature affecting everyone else (Butterfly Effect), of uncertainity and unpredictability. Some sentences about Hinduism are particularly well written, say quoting from the book " Can there be anything more stupendous than the conception that the universe has no beginning and no end, but passes everlastingly from growth to equilibrium, from equilibrium to decline, from decline to dissolution, from dissolution to growth, and so on till eternity?" Larry's description resonates with the beliefs and ideas I was taught while growing up in India. And since I have stayed in US for three years now, I guess I read into novel the kind of questions that I have faced: choice between materialism and spiritualism, choice between love and ambition, between my own country and the land of opportunity, of religion and beliefs! If you are a wanderer, and faced with such questions of life and reality, maybe you will love this book as much as I did! It ain't only a love story, does not mean it isn't a good love story. Read it, maybe you will like it too!
Rating:
Summary: Superlative storytelling
Review: Rarely can a book truly pull you in from the moment you commence reading. Well, The Razor's Edge is the exception to the rule. It is not only the mark of a good book, but a sublime storyteller. The incredible combination of an extraordinary melange of remarkably eclectic and certifiably unforgettable characters, a masterfully woven premise of singular quality, as well as a suave and melodious prose that virtually flows off of the page all emanate early and often from Maugham's pen in The Razor's Edge. While much has been made of the inscrutable idealist Larry Darrell, I found myself equally fascinated by the beautiful, yet cold and predictable Isabel, the banality of everyman Gray, the irrepressible flair of Elliott Templeton, the vague goings-on of Maugham, and, last but not least, the expressly antithetical, yet similarly intriguing, tales of Suzanne Bouvier and Sophie Macdonald. What makes The Razor's Edge so engrossingly captivating is the dichotomy of Maugham employing himself as the first person narrator and the irrefutable fact that the book draws from a vast multitude of his personal experiences -- both of which add immensely to the verisimilitude of the experience. In short, it has the feel of a memoir of sorts -- a true testament to Maugham's genius. "He's the idealist, he's the dreamer of a beautiful dream, and even if the dream doesn't come true, it's rather thrilling to have dreamt it." - Maugham
Rating: 
Summary: Not what it appears to be...
Review: 'The Razor's Edge' is usually billed as the story of Larry Darrell, a young man on a spiritual journey. However, the bulk of the text concerns Elliott Templeton, as he journeys from middle to old age, as a garrulous, opinionated, in some sense well-meaning, but in many ways tragically limited character. His motivations remain overtly uncharted, yet much is implied. Prime among these implications is his sexual orientation.
*
Maugham himself is the narrator and a character in this novel; hence, it's not unreasonable to think that his own life history would be relevant to the book. Jeffrey Meyer's recent biography, available on Amazon, is a good source of information. Maugham was married, unhappily, and during the Second World War, openly admitted his homosexuality, living as a homosexual for the rest of his long life. He published 78 books, selling over 40 million copies. Many, if not all, his characters were reportedly based on people he knew in real life. There are suggestions, then, that Elliott is an amalgam of several persons, possibly even of some aspects of Maugham himself. It's worth bearing in mind that homosexuality was illegal in England at the time the book was written. This in itself might go some way to explaining why certain matters are implied rather than directly addressed.
*
The Larry Darrell character is less insightfully presented that one might expect. He seems more the object of infatuation of several of the characters, not least of Maugham himself. As such, he is indulged, even when his actions might, objectively, be objectionable or obscure. His ruminations upon mysticism, in particular, are related by Maugham in a spirit of tolerance, with the occasional, very much muffled, hint of skepticism. His physical appearance, in contrast, is openly admired and, rather repetitiously, drawn to the reader's attention.
*
The treatment of the female characters is far less sympathetic, but, for that, far more realistic. They are variously portrayed as hedonistic, materialistic, lost, and mothering. Their lusts are generally far more earthy than those of the ethereal Larry. They are also capable of far greater hatred, as a particular turn in the plot reveals.
*
It's tempting to accuse Maugham of a certain degree of misogyny, except that it would be more accurate to label him a misanthopist, and indeed he has been labelled so; the fact that Larry escapes his scorn is less a contradiction of this indictment than a reflection of Larry's insubstantiality - his actions and personality are hardly human, approaching more those of an archetypal saint figure.
*
The writing style is very readable, without ever becoming elevated and enjoyable for its own sake. This is in keeping with the book's wide popularity.
*
Personally, I was very surprised by the difference between the book's reputation and its reality. If you are intrigued by Elliott Templeton and Maugham himself, then this will be an interesting read, as much for what is not said as for what is; if, however, Larry is the lure, then much will remain elusive.
Rating:
Summary: Maugham's Best Work -- Must Read
Review: While some rate the quality of the religious or philisophical references of this book, that really isn't the soul of the story. This is a story of a young combat veteran for whom the superficial luxuries of the world no longer have value. He must decide if his life was worth saving and why. What he discovers isn't the "Meaning of Life" or any religious ecstasy -- in fact, he arrives closer to the beginning than he thinks. But he goes with an appreciation for life and lives. I tried to be a Somerset Maugham fan but for me, this is far and away his best work. The characters are reallistically shallow, or lost, or gritty -- as the case may be. I reread this every couple of years just to remind myself of what a good story really sounds like. -Mike
|
