Christmas Holiday (Vintage Classics)
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"The modern writer who has influenced me the most." - George Orwell
Book Description
A coming-of-age novel that moves from genteel British society to the grim underworld of Paris before the war
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is an interesting book for today's readers. Published in 1939 before the outbreaking of the war, it shows how aware Maugham was of the politics in Europe. Through Charlie's eyes we see a world falling to pieces. His parents represent something on the verge of destruction. Simon shows us what is wrong with us as humans. But it's really the girl's story that captures the author's heart - although is she is presented to us to the cynicism that is Maugham's trademark. One can't help but like her, her story and the book, while feeling a bitter taste in one's mouth. A book to make you think.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is an intricate, characterful reworking of Crime and Punishment. A young middle class man visits Paris for a holiday and is introduced by an old friend to an impoverished young woman whose family has fled the Russian Revolution. One character is a man who murders as a symbol of his own personal fulfilment, but the more dangerous man is the visitor's friend, whose Nietzchean hero to be emulated is the communist police chief Dzershinsky. Written just before the second world war, this carries a warning to a complacent England of the rise of fascism.
Format:Paperback
It will be a sad day for me when I run out of Somerset Maugham novels to read. Christmas Holiday is not one of his best-known books, but it is on par with the best.
At the heart of the novel is a plot-driver frequently taken up by Maugham: the protagonist falls in love with someone who does not by any measure deserve him or her. Indeed, in one of the characters' own words here: '...I can't imagine anything more heart-rending than to love with all your soul someone that you know is worthless' (page 239). Such is also the premise of The Painted Veil, Theatre, The Magician, and of course of the masterpiece, Of Human Bondage. But it is given a new twist here in that the story is told from the perspective of a third party, a young Englishman on a visit to Paris.
Thus the book begins with Charley Mason's decision to spend a few days in the French capital over Christmas, on a visit to a childhood friend with a foreign correspondent's posting. But the mischievous Simon has planned something else for Charley than a romp about town. Charley Mason is soon drawn to the sad tale of Lydia, Russian exile, wife of a convicted murderer, and now prostitute in a classy brothel. The focus shifts to Lydia's luckless life. Smart, sensitive, she is our sufferer of hopeless love: for the worthless Robert Berger, the small-time crook who once married her, turned killer, and is now imprisoned in Guyana. Mason is confronted with lives wasted in solitude, danger, destitution. Maugham lets us peer at the 1930s Paris underworld and the abject condition of its shipwrecked Russians. But the novel's strength draws from the contrast with Mason's own respectable and moneyed, English background. Thus Mason takes Lydia to the Louvre, only to see her play havoc with the preconceptions cherished by his family of amateur artistic patrons. And his Christmas Holiday becomes the prompt for a re-evaluation of Mason's charmed but futile-looking existence back in London.
This is a rich and vividly written novel, though gloomy and perhaps not best read over a Christmas holiday itself. One of the worthiest Maughams.
At the heart of the novel is a plot-driver frequently taken up by Maugham: the protagonist falls in love with someone who does not by any measure deserve him or her. Indeed, in one of the characters' own words here: '...I can't imagine anything more heart-rending than to love with all your soul someone that you know is worthless' (page 239). Such is also the premise of The Painted Veil, Theatre, The Magician, and of course of the masterpiece, Of Human Bondage. But it is given a new twist here in that the story is told from the perspective of a third party, a young Englishman on a visit to Paris.
Thus the book begins with Charley Mason's decision to spend a few days in the French capital over Christmas, on a visit to a childhood friend with a foreign correspondent's posting. But the mischievous Simon has planned something else for Charley than a romp about town. Charley Mason is soon drawn to the sad tale of Lydia, Russian exile, wife of a convicted murderer, and now prostitute in a classy brothel. The focus shifts to Lydia's luckless life. Smart, sensitive, she is our sufferer of hopeless love: for the worthless Robert Berger, the small-time crook who once married her, turned killer, and is now imprisoned in Guyana. Mason is confronted with lives wasted in solitude, danger, destitution. Maugham lets us peer at the 1930s Paris underworld and the abject condition of its shipwrecked Russians. But the novel's strength draws from the contrast with Mason's own respectable and moneyed, English background. Thus Mason takes Lydia to the Louvre, only to see her play havoc with the preconceptions cherished by his family of amateur artistic patrons. And his Christmas Holiday becomes the prompt for a re-evaluation of Mason's charmed but futile-looking existence back in London.
This is a rich and vividly written novel, though gloomy and perhaps not best read over a Christmas holiday itself. One of the worthiest Maughams.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Lesser Maugham
The synopsis of this book is deceiving; it promises more than it delivers. Yes, a young man does go to Paris hoping to have fun and instead uncovers a dark world he has hitherto... Read more
Published on 19 Jun 2008 by Charles
disappointing and dull.
As a big fan of Maugham I had high hopes for this, particularly as some of his best work has been partially-set in Paris ("The Moon and Sixpence", "Of Human Bondage", "The... Read more
Published on 28 Sep 2003 by S. Hapgood
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