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Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽'s Reviews > Of Human Bondage
Of Human Bondage
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Tadiana ✩Night Owl☽'s review
bookshelves: classics, historical-fiction, dnf, your-mileage-may-vary
Apr 14, 2018
bookshelves: classics, historical-fiction, dnf, your-mileage-may-vary
DNF at 25%. This 1915 semi-autobiographical novel by W. Somerset Maugham just isn’t working for me. Of Human Bondage meanders slowly through the childhood and young adult life and times of Philip Carey, an orphaned young man with a rather tough life and a LOT of hang ups.
It’s insightful but prosy and very long-winded, with characters who aren’t particularly appealing making lots of poor decisions (and I didn't even get to the biggest one! Thank you, Wikipedia plot summary).
I know this is generally considered Maugham’s masterpiece and my literary GR friends pretty much all gave it 5 stars, but I just can’t with it right now. Maybe later some day.
It’s insightful but prosy and very long-winded, with characters who aren’t particularly appealing making lots of poor decisions (and I didn't even get to the biggest one! Thank you, Wikipedia plot summary).
I know this is generally considered Maugham’s masterpiece and my literary GR friends pretty much all gave it 5 stars, but I just can’t with it right now. Maybe later some day.
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Reading Progress
March 17, 2018
– Shelved
March 17, 2018
– Shelved as:
classics
March 17, 2018
– Shelved as:
historical-fiction
March 18, 2018
–
5.0%
"Insensibly he formed the most delightful habit in the world, the habit of reading: he did not know that thus he was providing himself with a refuge from all the distress of life; he did not know either that he was creating for himself an unreal world which would make the real world of every day a source of bitter disappointment."
March 19, 2018
–
Started Reading
April 14, 2018
– Shelved as:
dnf
April 14, 2018
– Shelved as:
your-mileage-may-vary
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Valerie
(new)
Apr 14, 2018 08:16PM
Good for you, girl. The most we can rid ourselves of the notion that there are books we HAVE to read, the better off we'll be. Maybe there will be a day for this book in your life, but if not, there are LOTS of other books out there.
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Valerie wrote: "Good for you, girl. The most we can rid ourselves of the notion that there are books we HAVE to read, the better off we'll be. Maybe there will be a day for this book in your life, but if not, ther..."Thanks, Valerie! I feel a little guilty that I didn't like this one, but I'll pick another classic to take its place. :)
I hear you, Tadiana, think I tried this one some years ago and ended up putting it aside unfinished (together with The Moon and Sixpence). But I love his writing style, so will probably try again with his short stories, which should be less long-winded and prosy as you said, and more varied, and maybe also his shorter novel The Narrow Corner. I probably would have liked The Painted Veil, but I've already watched the movie three times... ha ha :)Sorry it didn't work, nice review! :)
Sorry you didn't like "Of Human Bondage." I really, really liked it. Joe
Joseph wrote: "Sorry you didn't like "Of Human Bondage." I really, really liked it. Joe"I KNOW. Mea maxima culpa.
You know how it is... It might be you are not in the mood for it at this time, or might be it just isn't your cup of tea... Either is OK😀.
I will confidently predict that you will grow less patient with books that don't work for you as you grow older. Ask your Dad about this sometime....
I'm 65 and I'm growing more impatient with books that don't work for me. But sometimes, you have to read farther than the first 25% to get hooked. It's what happened to me with the SF stories Foe by Iain Reid. And I don't regret at all to have been a little more patient. ;)
