It has been a long time since I have read any fiction book. So, thought of reading one, on this weekend to take a break from stats, programming and the usual routine. It took me about 9 hours to read the entire book and I must say that there was not a single instance during those 9 hours that I felt like taking a break. So, the book has a smooth flow of prose with just enough characters that you don't lose the story or get bored anywhere. The plot has about 15 characters , including one played by the author himself, Somerset Maugham but not all 15 characters get the same footage(obviously) .The protagonist of the story is Laurence Larry Darrell who goes on a spiritual quest and the book tries to weave a story around that quest. The other 13 characters come and go in with varying periodicity through out the book. Besides Larry, the main characters in the story are Isabel who loves Larry but ends up marrying Gray Maturin, Elliott Templeton, Isabel's uncle whose sole purpose in life is to socialize and be at parties, Sophie MacDonald, a poetess turned whore turned dope addict, whom Larry almost ends up getting married, but thanks to a Isabel's devious plan, never does so.
The story starts off with Larry being engaged to Isabel. After a stint in the army, Larry is a changed man. He wants to understand about God, Evil, role of knowledge in salvation and whole lot of things that any spiritually inclined person would seek. The difference though is that many of us, answer or seek answers to these questions, while keeping a day job, holding the responsibilities of a spouse, a parent etc. Not Larry. He has no intention to work and he tries to argue with Isabel, that in his meager income they can live a decent life. Despite Isabel deeply in love with Larry, she rejects him. I guess for some people, economic considerations weigh far more than matters of the heart, when it comes to settling down with somebody. Isabel gets married to a business magnet,Gray Maturin. Larry then goes on a quest that takes him to Germany, Spain and India. He finally gets some clarity after staying in India at an Ashram for a few years and meeting some spiritually inclined people in India.
The book does have a dose of aspects from Hinduism like karma, renunciation, rebirth, etc. But the author makes it clear that he never intends of summarizing or even talking at length about such aspects in his book. He is clear about his role, i.e a storyteller. I must say he has played his role as a character and as an author with perfection , as he make spiritual elements, the various locations , a dozen characters as props to show the conversion of an atheist Larry to a devout spiritual person by the end of the book. No wonder this book is rated as one of the finest works of Somerset Maugham. However the movie adaption met with a commercial failure.
Some quotes / conversation that I found interesting amongst the various characters in the novel are :
- I wish I could make you see how much fuller the life I offer you is than anything you have a conception of. I wish I could make you see how exciting the life of spirit is and how rich in experience. It's illimitable. It's such a happy life. There's only one thing like it, when you are up in a plane by yourself, high, high and only infinity surrounds you.You are intoxicated by the boundless space. You feel such a sense of exhilaration that you wouldn't exchange it for all the power and glory in the world.
- I had not the heart to laugh at Elliott any more, he seemed to me a profoundly pathetic object. Society was what he lived for, a party was the breath of his nostrils, not to be asked to one was an affront, to be alone was a mortification; and, an old man now, he was desperately afraid. It made me sad to think how silly, useless and trivial his life had been. It mattered very little now that he had gone to so many parties and had hobnobbed with all those princes, dukes, and counts. They have forgotten him already.
- We are all greater than we know and the wisdom is the means to freedom. For Salvation, it is not essential to retire from the world , but only renounce the self. Work done with no selfish interest purifies the mind and that duties are opportunities afforded to man to sink his separate self and become one with the universal self.
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