A Holiday Break: Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham

Books are always the best holiday gift for me. The only thing I like better than the anticipation of reading a long sought after title is the fondness that comes with remembering the discovery of an unexpected treasure.

As I look back on all the books I've profiled here in 2020, the one I'd most like to revisit is Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham. I only blogged about it two weeks ago, but it is still my stand-out for the year.

I remember reading it as a high school English assignment, and not really understanding it then. But now, eleven years older than Maugham was when he published it, I found it to be a revelatory experience.

Like life, it is dark and brutal; its overall theme being the uselessness of the mind’s tender philosophy in the face of the universe’s brutal determinism.

He considered with some irony the philosophy which he had developed for himself, for it had not been of much use to him in the conjecture he had passed through; and he wondered whether thought really helped a man in any of the critical affairs of life: it seemed to him rather that he was swayed by some power alien to and yet within himself, which urged him like that great wind of Hell which drove Paolo and Francesca ceaselessly on. He thought of what he was going to do and, when the time came to act, he was powerless in the grasp of instincts, emotions, he knew not what. He acted as though he were a machine driven by two forces of his environment and his personality; his reason was someone looking on, observing the facts but powerless to interfere: it was like those gods of Epicurus who saw the doings of men from their empyrean heights, and had no might to alter one smallest particle of what occurred.

But yet, it is the mind, bound as it ever is to human desire, that can, in its introspection, still give one the greatest joy. 

He accepted the deformity which had made life so hard for him; he knew that it had warped his character, but now he saw also that by reason of it he had acquired that power of introspection which had given him so much delight. Without it he would never have had his keen appreciation of beauty, his passion for art and literature, and his interest in the varied spectacle of life. The ridicule and the contempt which had so often been heaped upon him had turned his mind inward and called forth those flowers which he felt would never lose their fragrance.

And that in this struggle, we are all alike.

Then he saw that the normal was the rarest thing in the world. Everyone had some defect, of body or of mind: he thought of all the people he had known (the whole world was like a sick-house, and there was no rhyme or reason in it), he saw a long procession, deformed in body and warped in mind, some with illness of the flesh, weak hearts or weak lungs, and some with illness of the spirit, languor of will, or a craving for liquor. At this moment he could feel a holy compassion for them all. They were the helpless instruments of blind chance.

As you enjoy your holiday break, I hope you find some time to curl up with a good book. I know I will.

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This post was written by Eric Lanke, an association executive, blogger and author. For more information, visit www.ericlanke.blogspot.com, follow him on Twitter @ericlanke or contact him at eric.lanke@gmail.com.