He was a brilliant teller of tales, one of the most widely read authors of the twentieth century, and at one time the most famous writer in the world, yet W. Somerset Maugham’s own true story has never been fully told. At last, the fascinating truth is revealed in a landmark biography by the award-winning writer Selina Hastings. Granted unprecedented access to Maugham’s personal correspondence and to newly uncovered interviews with his only child, Hastings portrays the secret loves, betrayals, integrity, and passion that inspired Maugham to create such classics as The Razor’s Edge and Of Human Bondage.

Hastings vividly presents Maugham’s lonely childhood spent with unloving relatives after the death of his parents, a trauma that resulted in shyness, a stammer, and for the rest of his life an urgent need for physical tenderness. Here, too, are his adult triumphs on the stage and page, works that allowed him a glittering social life in which he befriended and sometimes fell out with such luminaries as Dorothy Parker, Charlie Chaplin, D. H. Lawrence, and Winston Churchill.

The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham portrays in full for the first time Maugham’s disastrous marriage to Syrie Wellcome, a manipulative society woman of dubious morality who trapped Maugham with a pregnancy and an attempted suicide. Hastings also explores Maugham’s many affairs with men, including his great love, Gerald Haxton, an alcoholic charmer and a cad. Maugham’s courageous work in secret intelligence during two world wars is described in fascinating detail—experiences that provided the inspiration for the groundbreaking Ashenden stories. From the West End to Broadway, from China to the South Pacific, Maugham’s restless and remarkably productive life is thrillingly recounted as Hastings uncovers the real stories behind such classics as “Rain,” The Painted Veil, Cakes & Ale, and other well-known tales.

An epic biography of a hugely talented and hugely conflicted man, The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham is the definitive account of Maugham’s extraordinary life.

賽琳娜•黑斯廷斯Selina Hastings，英國著名傳記作傢，英國最高文學奬布剋奬評委。曾在The Daily Telegraph任職記者，後從事文學創作，已齣版多部名人傳記。已齣版的主要作品有《南希•米特福德傳》、《伊夫林•沃傳》、《毛姆傳——薩默塞特•毛姆的秘密生活》，等等。

譯者介紹

趙文偉，專職譯者，已齣版譯作三十餘本。主要譯作有卡爾維諾《瘋狂的奧蘭多》、卡斯頓•勒鬍《歌劇魅影》、阿加莎•剋裏斯蒂《寓所謎案》、《ABC謀殺案》，羅大裏童話係列、瑪麗亞•特蕾莎•安德魯埃托《少年斯特法諾》、亞當•威廉姆斯《慈禧的麵子》等。