The Painted Veil
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Product Description
Review
Reveals many of Maugham's strengths: an understanding of women, meticulous craftsmanship and raw emotion' Daily Mail
Book Description
Stunningly rejacketed as part of a major reinvention of this neglected 20th century master
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
24 of 25 people found the following review helpful
Format:Mass Market Paperback
This a book that became one of my instant favourites. It tells the story of Kitty, the beautiful though superficial wife of socially inept doctor Walter Fane. Bored of life in Hong Kong she begins and affair with Charles Townsend whom she finds eminently more suitable. Ultimately her deception uncovered her husband exacts an unusual vengeance making her accompany her to a cholera ridden province in mainland China. Whilst the story line is fascinating in itself the real beauty of the novel comes from the descriptions of the feelings both husband and wife have for each other. Both come of as incredibly human with believable flaws, and though I was slightly disappointed with the ending the rest of the novel continually delighted me.
41 of 45 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
It doesn't start off very promisingly. Kitty is having an illicit afternoon liaison with her lover, Charles Townshend, and it's all so very British Empire. Talk of tiffin and men in topi's can make it feel like "Carry On Up The Khyber", albeit set in China instead of India! But after that first short chapter you quickly get drawn into it. Kitty, in spite of her faults, is a very likeable and only-too-human heroine, and her husband, Walter Fane, is one of the most intense and complex characters Maugham ever wrote. Fane takes a disturbingly bizarre revenge on his wife's infidelity by making her accompany him to a cholera-ridden village in the wilds of China. Once there, Kitty seeks spiritual salvation and insight, and succeeds. Sadly, there is to be no happy ever after for this couple, and I was genually saddened that this was so. But Maugham, with his usual sharp insight, gives us great insight into the bit players in Kitty's life, such as Waddington and his mysterious Chinese princess, and the Mother Superior at the convent. This is good stuff.
10 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Format:Mass Market Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase
The Painted Veil pits amiable but unscrupulous fools against tormented souls, has a duly sarcastic starting-point, and is set in far-away, warlord-era China; in short, it has the ingredients for vintage Maugham.
The book begins in Hong Kong, with an adultery scene. Kitty Fane is beautiful, shallow, and calculating. She soon finds her match in Charles Townsend, a vain and cynical but popular colonial official - and in her own husband, the lover's very photo-negative, who drags her through plague-ridden country in revenge. The story is that of her spiritual transformation. It can even be read to show women's superior ability for moral elevation.
The Painted Veil is full of Maugham's innumerable human insights, and it is filled with danger, physical and psychological. This is an easy to read, absorbing novel. Readers expecting lush visions of warlord-era China to jump from the page, though, will need to look in another place. The "native" country is distant, dream-like and morbid, seen through the eyes of the heroine, whose preoccupations are elsewhere. It is only peered at from the height of a curtained palanquin. Indeed, the novel paints the superficial and self-centred expatriate community of Hong-Kong much more than it does labouring China; as such, it probably remained true to life until very recent times.
The book begins in Hong Kong, with an adultery scene. Kitty Fane is beautiful, shallow, and calculating. She soon finds her match in Charles Townsend, a vain and cynical but popular colonial official - and in her own husband, the lover's very photo-negative, who drags her through plague-ridden country in revenge. The story is that of her spiritual transformation. It can even be read to show women's superior ability for moral elevation.
The Painted Veil is full of Maugham's innumerable human insights, and it is filled with danger, physical and psychological. This is an easy to read, absorbing novel. Readers expecting lush visions of warlord-era China to jump from the page, though, will need to look in another place. The "native" country is distant, dream-like and morbid, seen through the eyes of the heroine, whose preoccupations are elsewhere. It is only peered at from the height of a curtained palanquin. Indeed, the novel paints the superficial and self-centred expatriate community of Hong-Kong much more than it does labouring China; as such, it probably remained true to life until very recent times.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
Shocking and entirely unexpected
I agree with the reviewer who commented that it starts badly, but only later do you realise how thoroughly deliberate that is. Read more
Published 7 days ago by WillDavies
The Painted Veil
The Painted Veil is a wonderful classic novel. While the thINKing edition does revert to Maugham's use of Tching-Yen rather than Hong Kong, it does also unfortunately contain a... Read more
Published 13 days ago by Wendy
Couldn't put it down!
I adored this book - it's a rattling good tale from the very first page. I love it when books instantly draw you in and this is exactly what you get with The Painted Veil. Read more
Published 27 days ago by SarahJane
Spellings alert!
My comments relate to the Thinking Media (Spiritual Classics) version of this title. I have never read a book with so many typos/mistakes. Read more
Published 2 months ago by smartreader
Great read that will leave you thinking for a while...
I had never read any Maugham until this was selected for our book club. I wasn't too excited by the book description (especially when I read the words 'spiritual awakening') but... Read more
Published 6 months ago by M Arif
Excellent Book
This is my favorite book by Somerset Maugham. The characterisation is wonderful, love the atmosphere, and the era in which it's set.
First class novel.
First class novel.
Published 7 months ago by Judge
Review by Patricia's Particularity
I, like many others, saw the movie first (I am a huge Edward Norton fan!). I have come to learn that when I see a movie first that when I pick up the book I have to look at the... Read more
Published 10 months ago by Patricia Leppla
Best works!!! Highly recommended.
W.Somerset Maugham may not be read much nowadays.It is a pity!!! It is a very good literature and good literature is timteless. His pages are very clean and very readable. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Luiz A. A. Fagundes
different from the film - but still worth reading
As others have already said, this is a story of Kitty and Walter Fane, a mis-matched English couple living in Hong Kong during the mid 1920s. Read more
Published 13 months ago by Ms. K. J. Waghorn
Very different to the movie!
I bought this because I loved the Edward Norton version of the book. If you were swept away by the movie, do not read this version. The movie deviated quite alot from the novel. Read more
Published 15 months ago by Yan
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