Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham Review

At this point in my career in reading, I feel comfortable saying that I’ve read my fair share of classics, the oldish ones are usually more confusing than delighting. The Beautiful and Damned had me lost, the writing in Lolita gave me an aneurysm, Death of a Salesman had me googling the entire plot while I read. I saw Of Human Bondage on the dollar rack at my local secondhand bookstore and passed it up, but regretted it immediately after reading about it a bit online. So when I found another copy in another store a month or two after, it had to be fate. I decided to challenge myself, despite expecting to be bombarded with out of date scenarios, stuffy characters, a meandering plot and ostentatious vocabulary. 

But instead, I found Of Human Bondage to be extremely approachable in terms of readability and the characters and plot were surprisingly modern. The book aged well considering it’s set in the late 1800s to early 1900s. There were serious moments, beautiful prose and Maugham has a wonderful capability to express and describe human emotions through self reflection: disgust, love, hatred, disappointment. I found myself also charmed by the way the plot had situations we find ourselves grumbling over in today’s society like situation-ships, friends with benefits, love bombing, gold digging and the like. As I read, I realized that some things aren’t quite as modern as we think, that even though we grieve how hookup culture has permeated our lives, it’s not like romance was picture perfect back then either, not much changed in fact. 

The main character, Philip, stumbles through changing many professions, awkward relationships and friendships, self hatred, etc. in this massive novel that honestly flies by when you get into it, it reads like a tv show or sitcom. I laughed at how he finds himself madly obsessed and in love with someone he objectively knows is horrible who could care less whether he lived or died, because haven’t we all been there? Mildred is perfectly horrid and dreadful, Philip is perfectly forgiving and his relationship with her child is so sweet. My heart clenched when they had their moments of affection in between the more over-arching tale of Philip's tumultuous relationship with her mother. 

I loved how self reflective he is, how kind, but also so utterly human. This story that follows him from his childhood to his adulthood never felt boring or that it dragged. He is so relatable in his confusion regarding the conditions of his existence, what he's alive to do and become, and his relationship with God after growing up religious. His friends come in and out of his life, he tries different hobbies, occupations, and seeing the world from his perspective is so refreshing when I've been living in my own body and mind and life, it felt like I was stepping into a movie or show every time I opened this book. There are just enough moments of realizations embedded into the plot to keep me enamored and wanting to read more. 

Overall, this one is a hulking ~600 page classic, but it’s so masterful and utterly worth the read.