Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham

I enjoyed The Moon and Sixpence so much that I was really excited to read this book, since apparently it's considered Maugham's 'masterpiece'. However, I must say that I liked The Moon and Sixpence much more. This book is way too long, and rather obviously autobiographical, in that there doesn't seem to be any sustained theme, the story lacks any tension or real interest. I mostly enjoyed the style, but it's somewhat lugubrious, it feels like a real Edwardian monster of a novel, with nothing very innovative (except some rather frank talk about sex, which today is utterly unremarkable). Some parts are gorgeous and dreamy and lovely, but a lot of it is just plain. I kept reading it because I hugely identify with the main character, Philip Carey. I wouldn't say I like him (because he's a lot like me and I'm very irritated with myself), but it made me feel better to read about someone who is so exactly like me (extreme shyness and reserve, propensity for falling obsessively in love with worthless people, spends way too much time pointlessly philosophising about life and drawing depressing conclusions). Funnily enough, I also, like Philip, am rather good at art, but I also feel that I lack any remarkable talent, and don't want to pursue it because I will never be anything other than mediocre. However, I found a lot of views about women in this novel fairly repulsive (the way they're always dismissed as inferior and stupid, good for nothing but having children), and I actually had a lot of sympathy with Mildred, a working-class girl Philip falls hopelessly in love with and also despises. Philip often blames Mildred for not responding to his advances enthusiastically, for not being passionate enough, for using men for her own entertainment and advantage, but I felt like it was her response to a world that uses all women, especially working-class ones, cruelly, so why should she be enthusiastic and obliging? I felt like Mildred was a case of a Thomas Hardy-type female character; specifically written by Maugham as stupid, shallow and selfish to associate these qualities with female independence, self-assertion, and violent responses to the way they are treated. In another Thomas Hardy-like instance of a sort of masculine 'poetic justice', Mildred ends up as a prostitute and (presumably) dying of syphilis, while Philip manages to carry on and assert his masculinity elsewhere, rather than learning some damn humility from his experience with Mildred. However, there are some really well-written and interesting parts, especially Philip's torturous adoration for Mildred, which often spills over into violent impulses (which he doesn't act on) and hatred. It's also a really interesting documentation of the details of late Victorian and Edwardian life of a large variety of classes, ages and places. Philip is, at various times, a schoolboy in a fairly elite school, a sort of 'study abroad' student in Germany, an art student in comparatively bohemian Paris, a medical student in London, and a worker in a shop, and all of these places and situations, the daily life and overall tone of the places, are described in great detail, which I found interesting, but I think people who aren't interested in the period would find it rather tedious.