Just Finished Reading The Razor's Edge by W. Somerset Maugham

W. Somerset Maugham was a noted English author famous in the early part of the twentieth century.  I already read one of his works, the 1908 short novel The Magician (here is a link to my April 2016 review of it [link]).  In 1944 he came out with The Razor's Edge, which turned out to be perhaps his most remembered work.  I just finished reading it and naturally have a few reactions to share with you...

The Razor's Edge spans the historical period from the end of World War I to the start of World War II, as well as the Atlantic Ocean between its American and British characters.  It is told in the first-person narrative by a nameless English writer who keeps in contact with the others and describes their progress with their respective lives over the years.  His main focus is on a young American named Larry Darrell who as an aviator fighter during World War I leaves the conflict changed and challenged as to what is truly important in life...and afterwards decides to walk the seldom-trodden path of a seeker.  He resists all of the social pressures around him to conform to his own society's norms, which involve seeking employment and acceptance into society, instead opting for a life of "loafing" off his stable and generous government pension and reading and traveling abroad in search of life's meaning.  In stark contrast, his fiancé Isabel, his best friend Gray (who happens to be in love with Isabel), and her uncle are all bent in each of their own ways on achieving worldly wealth and status...and naturally stand in opposition to Larry's outlook and plans.  As for himself, the narrator accepts Larry on his own terms and, by so doing, is accepted into the latter's confidence, providing a window into both his travels and his developing philosophical and religious beliefs, many of which ultimately derive from his sojourns through India.  Because of this, some have come to believe that The Razor's Edge went a long way toward the popularization of Eastern religious thought in the United States and the West in general, especially during the 1960s and later.  I will say that many of Larry's notions that he picked up while studying under Indian gurus today sound relatively commonplace, but I imagine that they would have been considered revolutionary and iconoclastic back in the 1940s when this novel first hit the bookstands...

The Razor's Edge is not a mystery or thriller, but rather a study of characters and the way people either compliantly accept what the society they live in tells them is important or instead challenge the status quo and seek their own answers...and perhaps more importantly, their own questions.  It is a very thoughtful novel that anyone interested in philosophy or feeling out of place in their own community and society would benefit by reading.  Am I a seeker?  Not to the extent that Larry is in this story, but compared to the vast majority of people I see around me who either are disinterested in life's meaning or simply allow themselves to be spoon-fed the questions and answers by others, I also share his general outlook if not all of his specific conclusions.  Only, unlike Larry, I don't believe that achieving enlightenment entails shedding my past and the social context I now live in, but rather through them come to a higher level of awareness and understanding.  Why don't you read The Razor's Edge and see what you think?