In the early years, I read a "Quick Reading Handbook of World Literature Famous Works" (Editor-in-Chief by Fang Zhou, China Youth Publishing House, 1999). When he bought the original and read it, he immediately "threw" a group of writers and went straight to Somerset Maugham. Later, all his Chinese translations were wiped out, filling the two rows of bookcases in the study.
In this "Maugham Counter", there is a "Lakeside Love" (China Federation of Literary and Art Circles Publishing Company, 1992). Purchased online, with cover signed "Maugham Waits". During that time, I was very hungry for "Maugham", ignoring the word "waiting" and thinking that the whole book was "Maugham". When I got the book, I opened the catalog and found that only the author of the first "Love by the Lake" (also translated as "The Pond") was Maugham. Of course, the latter authors could not be considered "famous", and I also read their works in the later days. However, I was thinking: Why didn't the editor write the author as "James Joyce is waiting", is it that their "suction" is not enough?
Obviously, this question is a little personal. In fact, I was really "sucked" by Maugham - if the author of the cover was replaced by anyone else, it would be difficult for me to have the fate with this book.
It seems that it is not appropriate to attribute it entirely to fame. Like Huxley, Updike, and Joyce behind, it is hard to say that they are not as famous as Maugham, but "why is Maugham"?
Then let me "personalize" again. After reading all of Maugham's Chinese translations, a "Maugham's map" immediately popped into my mind - it is not an exaggeration to say that Maugham is a complete "Donkey".
Maugham was "locked in", of course, because of his lifelong perseverance in human exploration; in my opinion, his travel friend characteristics make his works full of seductive exoticism.
The sense of distance has always been the premise of creating a sense of beauty. As a natural stranger, Somerset Maugham rejected the sameness and sought diversity—the sense of alienation of existence brought by his works is always irresistible. Full of magical calling due to distance.
Let’s talk about this “Love by the Lake”. The background is Apia in Western Samoa. This may not be so isolated in today’s highly developed information, but what about 20 or 50 years ahead? I can't stop fascinated by the rich exoticism in it. Coupled with the combined force of "The Moon and Sixpence", in 2017, on the centenary of Maugham's trip to the South Pacific, I flew from Shanghai to Tokyo, Japan, and then across the Pacific to Tahiti, the capital of Polynesia. Going back to the place where the material of Sixpence happened... If it weren't for the impact of the epidemic, in 2020 I would start to explore Maugham's European footprint.
At the beginning, after Maugham decided to write, several of the first scripts failed. He wrote in his diary: "Return to St. Thomas's Hospital to review for a year, and then find an errand for the ship's surgeon, at least have the opportunity to travel."
You see, travel is the starting point and destination of Maugham, and it is also a portrayal of his life. In his life, he has been doing two things seriously: traveling and writing.
Maugham's life, oh-long enough, was forty days and ninety-two. No matter where he lives, he always sets off to a certain destination on this earth again and again.
Departure, already embedded in his life. Maugham could not be in one place for more than three months or he would feel sick all over.
"I'm well aware that I've always longed to leave, to go abroad," he told his painter friend Gerard Kelly. "It's not as comfortable as in London, actually, but I just can't get over that pushing me. Anxiety to move forward."
Like these years-
In 1908 he went to Varenna, Madrid, Constantinople, Bursa, Capri and the Greek island of Corfu;
In 1909 he went to Paris, Antwerp, Brussels, the South of France, Milan, Athens and Venice, and also went on a hiking trip to the Peloponnese. This year, he made a plan to go to the United States;
In 1911 he went to Le Touquet, Ireland, the Balearic Islands, and in the fall to New York. However, at this time, he was full of longings for the Far East, "the scenery of Bangkok and Shanghai, the ports of Japan, the palm trees, the blue sky, the dark-skinned people, the fragrance of the East."
In 1912 he went to Spain, Paris, Prague, Marienbad and Munich. In September, after everyone else went home, he went to Rome alone. In November, immediately after returning to London, he went to New York;
From 1916 to the beginning of 1917, he temporarily gave up his spy status in Switzerland, and then went to the South Pacific from the United States. During this trip, he made frequent masterpieces, and "The Moon and Sixpence" became his representative work. And in the same year, he entered Russia again as a special agent;
In 1924, from Mexico City to the Yucatan Peninsula, Havana, Jamaica, British Honduras, and finally to Guatemala. Take a boat from Guatemala City to Hue in Indochina, and then take a boat to Marseille via Saigon;
In 1928, Maugham was mainly traveling—Denmark, Germany, Austria, Greece, Cyprus and Egypt.
During World War II, Somerset Maugham transformed himself into a British spy who broke into many countries and started "life on luggage". In Maugham's spy novel with "Ashenden" as the protagonist, the swaying and colorful place names connect the entire European territory. He "cruelly" squeezed writing material from every trip, and he refused to let go of the passengers' eyes.
Compared with today's rapid development across oceans and oceans, Maugham's period can be called "slow life". But this is far from stopping Maugham's heart that embraces the earth and desires to fly. Even in old age, trips remain at five to ten times a year. Maugham's contemporary British writer Christopher Isherwood said, "Maugham is reminiscent of a suitcase full of labels, and only God knows what's inside...".
In his twilight years, his beloved servant Alan faithfully accompanied him, and the most direct manifestation of this companionship was traveling together. Allen also admits that the most valuable thing about living with Maugham is the opportunity to travel: at the age of ninety, Maugham, who was sometimes confused, still urged Allen to go on the road...
Somerset Maugham loves other places, and allows himself to be there all the time.
No matter where you are, let literature be present first. The whole person goes to that station, which is poetry and distance. Therefore, in this world, people pay close attention to Maugham's beautiful journey, besides his works, and even sometimes, the latter is better than the former, which directly leads to the inseparability of his works and journeys.
After I read Maugham, I wanted to write such a book for a long time, to sort out the literary traces that belong to Maugham. Over the years, I have read all the Chinese translations of Maugham's works in China (there are as many as seven versions of "The Moon and Sixpence" alone), including nine versions of Maugham's biography. In fact, the map of the world above my computer desk has already been marked as "Maugham's Map" - in this book, I did not follow the chronological order, but delineated Maugham's travel itinerary. Different geographic sections: Europe, America, South Pacific, Southeast Asia, the East, especially the experience of agents who went to Switzerland, Russia, and the United States during World War II, as he said, "living on luggage".
This book also shows some aspects of Maugham's life that are different from ordinary people. For example, "Maugham in 1954" focuses on showing Maugham's splendid 80-year-old; "This Life, Two People" reveals the secrets of Maugham and the Two handsome boys who looked like life: the touching lives of Gerald Haxton and Alan Searle...
I tried to transplant such a "world map" belonging to Somerset Maugham into the text, to feel his wonderful, ups and downs and rich journey.
I would like to follow this "map", think again and again, and set off again and again.
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