miscellaneous

For what it may be worth, here's a fellow who collects Somerset Maugham books & letters on you Tube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ftxIvGuiAPA

and here's Jon Richards reads "The Letter"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqL1DBDrBKo

Somerset Maugham on video!

http://www.britishpathe.com/record.php?id=72538

LIFE's photos of Maugham:

http://www.life.com/search/?type=images&q0=Somerset+Maugham&itemsperpage...

By far my greatest favourite:

http://www.life.com/image/50528271

Old, but nice, article by the eminent Caxtonian Graig Showalter, the editor of Seventeen Lost Stories.

http://www.caxtonclub.org/reading/smaugham.html

Here is one special link for collectors:

http://mymaughamcollection.blogspot.com/p/about-my-maugham-collection_12.html

I generally despise collectors, for I don't quite understand how a book can be more important than its contents, but they are here some valuable things, especially in the section of books and articles about Maugham. Sadly, it hasn't been updated for about two months now.

Speaking of Maugham collectors, one of the most famous: Norman Moore. Stupendous collection, nicely described, with certain biographical and bibliographical points of interest:

http://www.normanmoore.com/wsm/contents.htm

2 rybie2....Thank you for the link to the Jon Richards reading of The Letter. I quite enjoyed it. But can I find the rest of the reading somewhere?
Mike

oh, sorry IronMike, I had not realized (not having watched the whole thing) that the reading was incomplete. How could they; what a cruel trick to play on we readers! I am looking for it online, but haven't found it. The work is included in several of the short story collections however

List of Maugham's "Ten Best Novels of the World"

http://home.comcast.net/~dwtaylor1/maughamstenbestnovels.html

hey, our photo seems to have disappeared. A change in LT perhaps?

first publication of "red" (in a magazine with an interview with a "Cannibal chief")

http://biblioboy.mybisi.com/product/vintage-asia-magazine-1921-somerset-maugham-...

If there are some aspiring learners of German, here is a very nice booklet in PDF format from Diogenes, the chief publisher of Maugham in German as far as I know. The text is simple, the illustrations are gorgeous.

http://www.diogenes.ch/leser/autoren/a-z/m/maugham_w_somerset/biographie

Check the download section.

Not Maugham- specific, but look at the originally proposed titles for famous works!

http://www.nytimes.com/1994/12/26/books/books-of-the-times-what-s-in-a-book-titl...

This issue relates to a question I am about to pose in oiur Trivia Quiz.

I just found this link to Maugham books that have sold at auction

http://historical.ha.com/common/search_results.php?Ntk=SI_Titles-Desc&Ntt=Ma...

Among them are books from Norman Moore's private collection.

the above link is of use to the scholar, as it shows covers and bibliographical information to many rare volumes

Goodreads friend Benjamin has redefined the meaning of the phrase "dedication to Maugham". Check this photo. :-)

http://d202m5krfqbpi5.cloudfront.net/photos/1374331773p8/808786.jpg

PS As clarified by him, this is his right shoulder.

A slight piece of fun.

The 10 Commandments of St Willie

1. All pleasure is good. Thou shalt experience all pleasures of the world, but thou shalt take precautions to avoid complications.

2. Thou shalt not anger thyself over the stupidity of others, or thou shalt perish from constant ire.

3. Thou shalt not believe in other biographers but Myself.

4. Thou shalt seek lucidity, simplicity and euphony in your writing. Thou shalt avoid obscurity, pretentiousness and dissonance.

5. Thou shalt read the classics diligently.

6. Thou shalt not read new books until they become at least a few years old, or thou shalt lose much of your precious time.

7. Thou shalt make a pattern for your life and endeavour to fulfil your character to the fullest possible degree.

8. Thou shalt transform your joys and sorrows into works of art.

9. Thou shalt remain aloof from the hysteria of the world.

10. Thou shalt not take people at their face value.

Maugham's legacy library on LT is now being developed. It will take a few weeks, perhaps a month, to complete the first version. Sources are incomplete and scarce, but the Library is expected to contain some 1100 distinct works.

Good morning/afternoon/evening, my dear friends.

I am Mr Maugham. You may call me Willie. I have just posted my first review on LibraryThing. I thought this auspicious event might interest you.

Yours sincerely,
Willie

An attempt to depict the cosmopolitan character of Mr Maugham on the map.

A little gallery with the authors of Maugham's "Ten Best Novels", including the portraits by Robert W. Arnold from Great Novelists and Their Novels.

very good, Mr Maugham!

what a nice map; thanks!

Did you know that Maugham's great-grandson, Derek Paravicini, is a blind autistic savant and a musical prodigy? I didn't. I found this fascinating video quite by accident. The name "Paravicini" attracted my attention, vaguely remembering that that was the name of one of Liza's husbands. A little online "research" showed that, sure enough, Nic Paravicini, Derek's father, is Maugham's grandson.

very interesting....

I'm sure friends of Maugham would be delighted to know that Willie has actually enriched the English language with the rare verb "frip". OED explains:

Of uncertain origin: used almost exclusively by W. Somerset Maugham and perh. his invention or related to dial. frap ‘to quarrel, dispute’ (Eng. Dial. Dict.).

intr. Esp. of couples: to quarrel or bicker.

Four examples are provided, three of them from Maugham, one from The Circle and two from the short story "The Social Sense" from Cosmopolitans:

1921 W. S. Maugham Circle ii. 38 It has struck me that whenever they started fripping you took a malicious pleasure in goading them on.
1936 ― Cosmopolitans 279 It was notorious among their friends that the couple did not get on. They had the distressing habit of fripping in public. Ibid. 287 Though Thomas nags me and makes scenes and we frip and get on one another's nerves, he loves me.

The last example is from The Looking Glass Murder by one "Anthony Gilbert":

1966 ‘A. Gilbert’ Looking Glass Murder iv. 69 Not that I ever heard them frip, they didn't even argue.

Obituary by Anthony Curtis of the eminent Maugham scholar John Whitehead who died in 1999.

If Mr Curtis is to be believed, Maugham himself planned one last collection of uncollected writings, but died before he could complete the task. Mr Whitehead did in 1984 with A Traveller in Romance. Also fascinating is to read about their joint editing of W. Somerset Maugham: The Critical Heritage by letters between London and Kent.

Mr Whitehead seems to have been an adventurous character (one wouldn't tell from his dry and pedantic writing), lawyer, writer, editor and scholar, with a good deal of travelling experience in the Far East.

interesting!