W. Somerset Maugham

W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) was a British novelist, playwright, and short-story writer whose career spanned more than sixty years. Trained as a physician, he qualified in 1897 but never practiced, turning instead to the theatre and, by his mid-thirties, to fiction; at one point four of his plays ran simultaneously in London's West End. He served with British intelligence during both World Wars, an experience later reflected in his fiction. His novels, including Of Human Bondage, The Moon and Sixpence, The Painted Veil, Cakes and Ale, and The Razor's Edge, along with short-story collections such as Ashenden, made him one of the best-selling authors of his time and shaped writers such as Graham Greene and George Orwell. He was appointed Companion of Honour in 1954 and Companion of Literature in 1960, and held honorary doctorates from Oxford and Toulouse.