The Painted Veil

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Scheduling their trysts upstairs of a curio shop, Kitty ultimately invites Charlie into her own bed while Walter should be at work. Charlie reassures her that even if Walter suspects infidelity, the doctor will be too cowardly to admit it. He pledges to stand by Kitty. Unable to take the guilt much longer, she's finally summoned by her husband for a talk. He announces that he's accepted a job at Mei-tan-fu, on a tributary of the Western River, where a cholera outbreak has left the town without a foreign doctor. Walter expects Kitty to accompany him and if she refuses, intends to file his petition for divorce, believing only a humiliation would compel Charlie Townsend to leave his wife and marry Kitty. You must be very hard to please," returned Kitty, in the bright, chaffing way she could assume so easily. "I suppose he's far and away the most popular man in Hong Kong."

So, it was no big surprise that Kitty spent her days in the arms of the charming, and also married, Charles Townsend, while Walter was busy at work. No doubt, the dumb twit was just the most recent in what was bound to be a long line of extramarital conquests for Charles. Stupid Kitty believed that he was as in love with her as she was with him. Poor fool. Mrs. Garstin is dismayed to realize that her only hope of achieving success is through her husband, and she pushes him relentlessly to success. She also strives to make advantageous connections by inviting important people to their home for dinner, but her tendency to cut corners in the effort to save the most money possible proves at odds with her political ambitions. Her husband never advances very far in his career. The two Garstin daughters have little affection for their father, seeing him primarily as a source of income. Kitty is vain, pretty and foolish. Walter adores her, but her feeble head is turned by a British expatriate, Charles Townsend, a notorious womanizer who is stationed in Shanghai. Kitty can not respect his love for her. Infatuation has always come easily for her. She has smoldering eyes and a lithe figure that drives men to distraction. ”What was it in the human heart that made you despise a man because he loved you?” That has been a question that has been asked for hundreds of years, if not thousands. What I have ascertained from the minefield of women that I’ve known is that a woman must not like herself very much to despise a man who loves her. It is sad that she considers him to be a fool to marry such a woman as she.Kitty Fane ruthlessly ridicules her husband, Dr. Walter Fane, to her lover as she dreams of marrying this cad she can't see is playing her. Though the husband Walter loves Kitty still, after he finds out of the affair, his jaundiced need to get even goads him into taking her on his mission to rural China, into the heart of the cholera epidemic. Kitty Fane is a spoiled brat who thinks nothing more than herself. One day she meets Walter Fane who is immediately taken with her and asks for her hand in marriage. Kitty agrees, not because she loves him, but for selfish reasons and saving face. They move from Britain to Hong Kong, where he's a bacteriologist. Kitty is more interested in parties and socializing, and it's here where she has an affair. The affair is with an absolute scoundrel who also thinks nothing more than himself. But Kitty is such a child and just wants to be loved by him. Walter discovers the affair and almost forces her to go with him to the heart of a cholera epidemic in China. Kitty has no love for her husband, but due to shame, and no where else to go, she follows Walter. Here is where Kitty really begins to grow up. Walter now loathes Kitty but he is starting to see her in another light. But he is so driven in helping the people affected with cholera and trying to save those who live there. I'll not say more to ruin the story. It had been a long time since I read one of the classics. When I saw 'The Painted Veil' on sale at Audible.com, I thought it would be a nice change of pace. I wasn't wrong. This book proved to be far better than I expected. The basic story is of a beautiful young British woman who has “played the field” too long. She’s now 25 and her plainer, younger sister is engaged. In desperation the main character marries an MD bacteriologist who takes her to Hong Kong where he works as a scientist.

Maugham uses a third-person-limited point of view in this story, where Kitty Garstin is the focal character.

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The Charlies of this world are grating on my nerves, but I have to admit Somerset Maugham nailed him. Vain, good-looking, brutally selfish and shallow, they come, they see, they conquer, they leave. Maugham plunges us into the center of the action with little explanation. We meet Kitty and Charles in the bedroom, and from their fearful reaction to an unknown presence outside, the reader can infer that their union is an illicit one. The mysterious turning of the knobs suggests an ominous and imposing presence, but the identity of this intruder is not yet revealed. Gradually, this section provides evidence that it was Walter, Kitty's husband, who turned the knobs. Percy Bysshe Shelley Quotes: “ Poetrylifts the veil from the hidden beauty of the world, and makes familiar objects be as if they were not familiar.” Overall: 4.7 (out of 5.0) I devoured this book. Kitty is so petty and unlikeable at the beginning, but I cheered her on at the end. It’s a well-paced character study that’s lively and even funny at times. Coming to Hong Kong, Kitty had found it hard to reconcile herself to her husband's lowly position as bacteriologist and within three months of marriage she had known she had made a mistake. It had been her mother's fault.

Townsend, ovviamente, si tiene stretto il suo matrimonio e non è affatto disposto a mettere tutto in discussione per dare seguito ‘legale’ alla sua scappatella con Kitty. What I learned in the reading of this wonderful short novel is that the film version is much more about the couple's relationship, whereas the book is much more about Kitty's coming of age. He has his little flirtations, but they're not serious. He's much too cunning to let them go to such lengths as might cause him inconvenience. And of course he isn't a passionate man; he's only a vain one. He likes admiration. He's fat and forty now, he does himself too well, but he was very good-looking when he first came to the Colony. I've often heard his wife chaff him about his conquests." In the words of Mark Twain: “Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it”Ce se întîmplă cînd vălul vieții, frumos zugrăvit, este îndepărtat printr-un gest decis? Adevărul din spatele lui te poate strivi sau te poate salva. Maugham alege a doua consecință. He spoke French even before he spoke a word of English, a fact to which some critics attribute the purity of his style. His parents died early and, after an unhappy boyhood, which he recorded poignantly in Of Human Bondage, Maugham became a qualified physician The biographer Richard Cordell notes that the The Painted Veil was influenced by the author Maugham's study of science and his work as a houseman (Maugham began training to be a doctor, but never completed his studies) at St Thomas' Hospital, London. Instead he was lured away from the profession by early literary success. Kitty accepts his proposal impulsively. She despises his fawning attentions. She has therefore never invested any emotion or even thought into the relationship. He takes her to Hong Kong where he works as a bacteriologist. There she meets Charlie Townsend, who intuitively senses the vulnerability in their relationship. He is charming, fit, and knows the right string of words to whisper in a silly, unhappy girl’s ear. Kitty is a fool, and she can’t for the life of her understand why Walter can’t see it.

Before its publication as a book in 1925, The Painted Veil had originally been serialised the previous year, both in Nash’s magazine in London and in the American publication Hearst’s International Magazine in New York. Unlike the unaltered American First Trade Edition released by Doran on March 20 th; the bibliographic history of this First English edition, originally released by Heinemann on April 23 rd, is quite complex due to two threatened libel actions which caused drastic alterations in the text and necessitated its reissue due to these censorship complications. I'm afraid your mother is dead," her father said on her return. "And I've never much cared for you, just as you've never much cared for me. I'm off to the West Indies, so you're rather on your own." Sometimes we find the film adaptation of the book first. That's what happened to me, with W. Somerset Maugham's story of an ill-fated marriage, The Painted Veil. I saw the film many moons ago. Description of places occasionally took my breath away. Description of clothes, facial appearances and manners are astute. Superb dialogs. What I am saying is that the writing, the language used, is exceptionally good! Sometimes lyrical, most often precise.This book got under my skin- first because I totally disliked Kitty and then because I really wanted everything to turn out well for her. I had a love hate relationship with her right from the beginning. For Walter, her husband, I felt mostly pity. An introvert who just didn’t know how to express his feelings. If only…If only either could have changed just enough.