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244th out of 3,795 books
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The Razor's Edge
Intimate acquaintances but less than friends, they meet and part in postwar London and Paris: Elliot, the arch-snob but also the kindest of men; Isabel, considered to be entertaining, gracious, and tactful; Gray, the quintessence of the Regular Guy; Suzanne, shrewd, roving, and friendly; Sophie, lost, wanton, with a vicious attractiveness about her; and finally Larry, so h...more
Paperback, 314 pages
Published
January 26th 2011
by Vintage
(first published 1944)
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I love this book. I absolutely adore it.
Larry has returned from the World War I and refuses to engage in life. Isabel, his finance, is a member of Chicago high society and Larry's lack of interest in life is causing her problems.
Grey, Larry's good friend and a successful stock broker, is loyal to Larry but is in love with Isabel.
Sound like a soap opera? It should. Told in the first person by Maugham himself, who runs into Larry every few years over a twent...more
Larry has returned from the World War I and refuses to engage in life. Isabel, his finance, is a member of Chicago high society and Larry's lack of interest in life is causing her problems.
Grey, Larry's good friend and a successful stock broker, is loyal to Larry but is in love with Isabel.
Sound like a soap opera? It should. Told in the first person by Maugham himself, who runs into Larry every few years over a twent...more
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I didn't love it as much as I expected. The premise that Eastern philosophy has something to offer us in the West just isn't as novel as when this book was originally published. Maugham's description of upper crust society in Paris is bitchy and wonderfully astute at times. But, like most authors, he found it easier to describe the sinners than the saints. Larry Darrell, the saint of this book, just doesn't seem human or interesting. He and his quest for enlightenment and/or belief in God are on...more
A Rye
rated it
Recommends it for:
Those who used to identify with Holden Caulfield, but are growing up.
Shelves:
philosophy
Boring for most, enlightening for some, and absolutely beautiful to very few, this book describes the journey of a man disillusioned with the materialistic predilections of society.
After some rather traumatic experiences as a fighter pilot in WW I, American Larry Darrell relocates to France, where he dedicates himself to a life of learning and seeking. A pilgrimage to India results in a spiritual revelation for Darrell, and it is at this point that his entire world begins to shift.
...more
After some rather traumatic experiences as a fighter pilot in WW I, American Larry Darrell relocates to France, where he dedicates himself to a life of learning and seeking. A pilgrimage to India results in a spiritual revelation for Darrell, and it is at this point that his entire world begins to shift.
...more
Back in the dark days of the mid-’80s, I read somewhere that Bill Murray was going to be in a movie called The Razor’s Edge, and that it was based on a book. Since this was long before the days where you could check IMDB to see what the movie was going to be about, I figured the book had to be hilarious since Murray was starring in it. So I found the book at the library and started reading. I was pretty shocked to find that it was a serious story about a guy who goes looking for the meanin...more
So let me start with a few of the reasons why I shouldn't have liked this book.
-I usually prefer contemporary fiction.
-The Americans are, for the most part, sad, sad characters. Eliot is obsessed with society and culture to the detriment of love and emotion. Isabel wouldn't marry Larry because he would never be rich, and she was disappointed when she inherited some Picassos and Matisses because they wouldn't match her modern decor. Gray was somewhat single minded about work.
-Th...more
-I usually prefer contemporary fiction.
-The Americans are, for the most part, sad, sad characters. Eliot is obsessed with society and culture to the detriment of love and emotion. Isabel wouldn't marry Larry because he would never be rich, and she was disappointed when she inherited some Picassos and Matisses because they wouldn't match her modern decor. Gray was somewhat single minded about work.
-Th...more
This book was given to me as a gift by a good friend. I had only a vague idea of what is was about, but as I started reading it, realized that it is an incredible work of fiction. I learned after reading it that it's actually more a work of non-fiction in that the narrator and the characters are based fairly closely on Somerset Maugham and people he knew well throughout his life.
Maybe for this reason, the character development in this novel is some of the best I've ever read. The nov...more
Maybe for this reason, the character development in this novel is some of the best I've ever read. The nov...more
Somerset Maugham continues to justify his place on my list of favorite writers. His narrative is crisp and moves the plot along well without giving characters or events short shrift. His insightful, soul-searching characters (which not all of them are) have the kinds of conversations you sometimes have and wish you did more often about philosophy, art, and life issues. He is able to find the good in his characters and yet no sugar-coat their flaws. This book will be helpful and meaningful fo...more
Maugham may literally be one of my favorite authors period. I have yet to read something of his that I haven't thoroughly enjoyed and wasn't grabbed by. While I haven't read all of his works yet, and there are several that I really like The Razor's Edge stands out as a real favorite. Which is unusual as I seem to prefer his stories that are set entirely in the east. Then again I'd been to Europe by the first time I'd encountered this book and since then I have traveled and stayed in Asia - an...more
My first Maugham, and definitely not the last.
The best novels are always unsettling, as this was when I saw so much of myself in the character of Larry Darrell.
It's the bittersweet sort of experience, this unsettling: more of an acknowledgment than a discovery.
The best novels are always unsettling, as this was when I saw so much of myself in the character of Larry Darrell.
It's the bittersweet sort of experience, this unsettling: more of an acknowledgment than a discovery.
I think I’d be tempted to give this one six stars if I could. I adored this book, and I regret not reading it when I was sixteen or so; even though you can’t properly understand much at that age, books that merely impress you later on “change your life” as a junior in high school. I believe this one would have done so, but I’m happy enough with the experience of having now read it at the ripe old age of 24.
I’m a sucker for books of the Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and now Maugham mold,...more
I’m a sucker for books of the Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and now Maugham mold,...more
My youngest daughter came home from college the other day with this book under her arm. I grabbed it and expected it to be great.
It almost met my expectations. Maugham's theme is to explore how the things we want most shape our lives. He sums it up in the final paragraph. Elliot valued social standing above all else. Isabel, a rich husband. Gray, to be one of the guys in business. Suzanne, security. Sophie, death. Larry, spiritual happiness.
One surprise to me is that no...more
It almost met my expectations. Maugham's theme is to explore how the things we want most shape our lives. He sums it up in the final paragraph. Elliot valued social standing above all else. Isabel, a rich husband. Gray, to be one of the guys in business. Suzanne, security. Sophie, death. Larry, spiritual happiness.
One surprise to me is that no...more
Maugham doesn't shy away from the dark side, and thank God for that. If you appreciated his depiction of the dull ache of unrequited love in Of Human Bondage (OHB), you will appreciate the disconnected angst and disillusion of World War I veteran Larry Darrell in Razor's Edge. Maugham drove a battlefield ambulance in France during World War I, and it touched him profoundly. Razor's Edge was written nearly 30 years after OHB, and it does come across as a more mature work because it is more nuanc...more
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by W. Somerset Maugham
Sorry to be getting this up later than usual. I've been keeping my nose to the grindstone with a rewrite of my novel and I read John Gardner's On Becoming a Novelist, which was good, but sort of dry and not really the sort of thing I'd recommend to anyone who isn't a writer. But this week I have jury duty, so I expect to be getting a lot of extra reading done in the process.
The Razor's Edge came up in last week's book, as something that character enj...more
Sorry to be getting this up later than usual. I've been keeping my nose to the grindstone with a rewrite of my novel and I read John Gardner's On Becoming a Novelist, which was good, but sort of dry and not really the sort of thing I'd recommend to anyone who isn't a writer. But this week I have jury duty, so I expect to be getting a lot of extra reading done in the process.
The Razor's Edge came up in last week's book, as something that character enj...more
I think Larry Darrell is my new hero. So is Bill Murray for doing the film in 1984, but that's another story. The novel follows the lives and developments of four main characters: an arch-snob with a heart of gold; a wreck of a woman who's lost her family; a woman who's chosen security over love, and an American seeking a spiritual meaning to his life.
That's Larry. He's my hero.
Larry rejects the life of a stockbroker after the Great War and goes on a "loafing odyss...more
That's Larry. He's my hero.
Larry rejects the life of a stockbroker after the Great War and goes on a "loafing odyss...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
Plain and simply, the story of Larry Darrell, a young man on something of a spiritual quest for higher learning. This story follows a large cast of characters, but at the center is Larry and how his quest effects his life and the lives of those around him, most notably his fiancée, Isabel.
In a recent NYT editorial, someone talked about how the 20s are the "odyssey" years where we sort of explore life and its/our possibilities. This absolutely addresses that period in life a...more
In a recent NYT editorial, someone talked about how the 20s are the "odyssey" years where we sort of explore life and its/our possibilities. This absolutely addresses that period in life a...more
I remember what I disliked about this book the first time I read it: Maugham tells you more about the people surrounding the main character than about the character himself. Which is kind of a drag since they are much less interesting. The book, then, is not about a man's search for meaning, but the reactions of his mostly upper middle class friends and acquaintances to this extreme eccentricity.
Reading it gives me a sense that the party is happening somewhere else. Fortunately,...more
Reading it gives me a sense that the party is happening somewhere else. Fortunately,...more
In art school I found this book, a battered paperback, in a cardboard box of other books left in the theater department parking lot. I don't remember any of the other books that were in the box. For some reason the book's title made me think of Apocalypse Now, so I picked it up. When I sat down to read it that evening I was captivated by the way Maugham tells the story of Larry Darrell. I stayed up until sunrise reading the book. Later I showed it to my philosophy professor, who praised the book...more
Although this book contains a great deal of reflection on modern religion, and contrasts Eastern and Western orthodoxies about the nature of God/the universe, and of course touches on various aspects of Catholicism along the way, I found that I could not add it to my unofficial "the Catholic Church does not come off well in this book" collection. Sadly, there are no scenes of Larry Darrell fighting off murderous members of the Swiss Guard in a desperate and bloody halberd duel. Well, t...more
This book was such a thinker.
I really enjoyed it. It takes place in the 20s, and about a young guy who decides he wants to find out the meaning of life rather than falling into what everyone expects him to do. During his time, the norm is to go to school, then to university, then to work for the rest of life. That was what was expected of a man. However, this guy, Larry, decides he wants to skip out on going to college, but rather live off as little as possible and just spend his time ...more
I really enjoyed it. It takes place in the 20s, and about a young guy who decides he wants to find out the meaning of life rather than falling into what everyone expects him to do. During his time, the norm is to go to school, then to university, then to work for the rest of life. That was what was expected of a man. However, this guy, Larry, decides he wants to skip out on going to college, but rather live off as little as possible and just spend his time ...more
Rating: 4.25* of five
It is pleasant to give yourself over to the care of a master, or mistress, of craft. The Razor’s Edge is masterful. It is an expression of the mastery Maugham earned through many long years of novel-writing and mostly successful critical reception of his work that this book, which came almost twenty years into a career of more than forty years, feels as fresh as his first book (The Moon and Sixpence). It deals, as is the case with so many writers’ oeuvres, with man...more
It is pleasant to give yourself over to the care of a master, or mistress, of craft. The Razor’s Edge is masterful. It is an expression of the mastery Maugham earned through many long years of novel-writing and mostly successful critical reception of his work that this book, which came almost twenty years into a career of more than forty years, feels as fresh as his first book (The Moon and Sixpence). It deals, as is the case with so many writers’ oeuvres, with man...more
O Fio da Navalha é uma obra grandiosa do famoso escritor e dramaturgo britânico Somerset Maugham, em que o autor veste a sua própria pele para contar a estória de um jovem americano – Larry – confrontado com a procura metafísica do sentido da vida.
A narrativa é temporalmente longa. Prolonga-se desde o final da primeira guerra mundial até ao inicio do anos quarenta e incide em duas frentes diferentes: existe uma estória romanceada, onde se contam as incidências sobre um conjunto de personag...more
A narrativa é temporalmente longa. Prolonga-se desde o final da primeira guerra mundial até ao inicio do anos quarenta e incide em duas frentes diferentes: existe uma estória romanceada, onde se contam as incidências sobre um conjunto de personag...more
The misogyny piled up to the stage where it just dragged my opinion of the book right down. The main female character is a very superficial woman whose expression of lust, like a bitch in heat, at one point makes the male narrator feel sick. The main reason the narrator is her friend at all is because he likes looking at her. She's cruel, in contrast to the male characters, about a friend of hers who became an alcoholic nymphomaniac when her husband and child died. And there's several little...more
“The sharp edge of a razor is difficult to pass over; thus the wise say the path to Salvation is hard.”
Larry Darrell chooses to live apart from the bourgeois path expected of him. Forever changed by the death of his flight mate during a WWI air skirmish, Larry chooses to seek out truth and the meaning of life through the accumulation of knowledge and experiences rather than follow the working man’s path expected of him. He breaks off his engagement with his beloved Isabel and wande...more
Larry Darrell chooses to live apart from the bourgeois path expected of him. Forever changed by the death of his flight mate during a WWI air skirmish, Larry chooses to seek out truth and the meaning of life through the accumulation of knowledge and experiences rather than follow the working man’s path expected of him. He breaks off his engagement with his beloved Isabel and wande...more
“The Razor’s Edge” really has a simple message. It asks us to reflect on how we lead our lives. Do we follow the masses or seek inner fulfillment? Is it right or wrong to drop out of society and follow our inner selves? Author W. Somerset Maugham makes the reader ponder these questions as he introduces his characters. The story is told by Maugham himself who plays a substantial role as the narrator of the story, interweaving all of the characters together. We are introduced foremost to Elliot Te...more
This book was published in 1944 and the story begins in the 1920's and proceeds into the 1930's. It's epigraph quoted at the beginnin is, "The sharp edge of a razor is difficult to pass over; thus the wise say the path to salvation is hard." Maugham begins by characterizing his story as not really a novel but a thinly veiled true account. He includes himself as a minor character who drifts in and out of the lives of the major players, and we come to know them by his account of his in...more
This is a book that my father long admired; I purchased it for him some years before his death. He was always captivated by the film (the Tyrone Power version, not the Bill Murray remake) and was interested in the book on which it was based. Whether he read the book or not, I don't know. It sat on my shelves for years before I finally decided to read it. I've never seen either film so this was virgin territory.
I was vaguely acquainted with the general story and time period but nothing ...more
I was vaguely acquainted with the general story and time period but nothing ...more
Some tough-to-like characters. Even the narrator, despite his compelling tone, was sort of annoying at times. Sort of like an obnoxious uncle that's a grudgingly good story teller. This is how I imagine Maugham was while alive.
Also, the majority of the characters drip with Edwardian pretentiousness. It seems as though Maugham wants to mock or critique this dated hierarchy, but he still ends up inhabiting this world. Maybe there was more complexity to these characters (Isabel, Elliot Te...more
Also, the majority of the characters drip with Edwardian pretentiousness. It seems as though Maugham wants to mock or critique this dated hierarchy, but he still ends up inhabiting this world. Maybe there was more complexity to these characters (Isabel, Elliot Te...more
The Razor's Edge is fiction, but written as though it were an account of the lives of a group of Americans whom Maugham encountered intermittently over a period of about fifteen years from the end of World War One to the early 1930s.
It is set mainly in France and although essentially an 'entertainment' it deals with the very serious question of what it is to lead a meaningful life. To this end it contrasts two men, Elliott Templeton, an older bachelor whose life revolves around lavi...more
It is set mainly in France and although essentially an 'entertainment' it deals with the very serious question of what it is to lead a meaningful life. To this end it contrasts two men, Elliott Templeton, an older bachelor whose life revolves around lavi...more
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From Wikipedia: William Somerset Maugham, CH, was an English playwright, novelist and short story writer. He was among the most popular writers of his era, and reputedly, the highest paid author during the 1930s.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._Somerset...
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“You're beginning to dislike me, aren't you? Well, dislike me. It doesn't make any difference to me now.”
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“For men and women are not only themselves; they are also the region in which they are born, the city apartment or farm in which they learnt to walk, the games they played as children, the old wives tales they overheard, the food they ate, the schools they attended, the sports they followed, the poets they read, and the God they believed in. It is all these things that have made them what they are, and these are the things that you can't come to know by hearsay...”
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