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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A literary James Bond.,
By A Customer
This review is from: Ashenden (Transaction Large Print Books) (Hardcover)
An amazing fictional account of Maugham's real life adventures as a spy for Great Britain during WW I. Written in Maughm's usual concise and elogant prose, these stories make the reader root for Ashenden who is nothing short of a literary James Bond. This account, written as a collection of short independent stories, shows that, when in the hands of an author with a command of the English language, suspense and intrigue can be create in a book in other ways besides stringing together one action scene after another. Simply Maugham at his best
1 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
VERY LOOSELY ORGANIZED, ALMOST NEVER SUSPENSEFUL, AND SUFFERS FROM A MAJOR QUALITY-CONTROL PROBLEM,
By
This review is from: Ashenden (Mass Market Paperback)
In my hardback copy of ASHENDEN (1927), Maugham's "Preface" (1941) provides autobiographical background and discusses how life and art differ in his fiction, with some snide remarks about other modern novelists; his comments on plot seem to be largely derived from Aristotle's Poetics. (Ironically, THIS book does not have any sort of A-to-Z plot that holds it together.) All in all, ASHENDEN is VERY LOOSELY ORGANIZED, ALMOST NEVER SUSPENSEFUL, AND SUFFERS FROM A MAJOR QUALITY-CONTROL PROBLEM: although a few passages are really excellent, many parts are very long-winded and seem out of place in an espionage book; many others (including several whole chapters) seem like padding.SPOILER ALERT: TO DEMONSTRATE THIS POINT, I'M WRITING A SUMMARY OF THE BOOK: Chapter 1 ("R."): Ashenden, a writer, meets the head of the British Secret Service and is recruited. Chapter 2 ("A Domiciliary Visit"): Returning from a mission to his hotel in Geneva, Ashenden finds Swiss police in his room; he easily thwarts them but wonders who has informed against him; similar to his "Preface," fiction and life and beginnings, middles, and ends are mentioned, with sniping at some writers of modern fiction. Chapter 3 ("Miss King"): Ashenden is called at 3 a.m. to the bedside of Miss King, the dying English governess of two Egyptian princesses, but she has had a stroke, and he is unable to get any message from her before she dies; if it is read alone, this chapter amounts to an Unsolvable Puzzle. Within the total book, either this episode must become relevant later, or Maugham is doing exactly what he has criticized other writers of doing. (Rather than give my own answer, I will let other readers of ASHENDEN think about this and decide which it is). Chapters 4, 5, and 6 form a unit. Chapter 4 ("The Hairless Mexican"): R. sends Ashenden to Italy on a new mission with General Carmona (aka the Hairless Mexican, a flamboyant and peculiar spy who is the type that Ian Fleming and others would later imitate in their works); their mission is to get papers that a Greek is going to pass along to the Germans. Chapter 5 ("The Dark Woman"): During their journey to Italy, the Hairless Mexican tells Ashenden about a woman he deeply loved but whose throat he cut, believing her to be a spy working for the Mexican government; then they discuss the conventions of Detective Fiction. Chapter 6 ("The Greek"): The Hairless Mexican murders the only Greek on the ship, and he and Ashenden search for the papers but find none; Ashenden finds a telegram waiting for him, and they go out to eat (Maugham has a good scene in which the Hairless Mexican dances with women, Zorba-like); Ashenden decodes his telegram at the railroad station and learns, ironically, that the Greek spy was delayed by illness and that the wrong Greek has been killed; thus far, this is the best chapter. Chapters 7 and 8 form a unit. Chapter 7 ("A Trip to Paris"): Ashenden gets a new mission: take the lover of an Indian freedom fighter to the border of Switzerland as bait to kill this man; Ashenden admires the opponent greatly, but R. calls the man a "greasy little [N-word]"; Ashenden surmises that R. reads "shilling shocker" detective fiction, speculates on R.'s apparent discomfort in high-class settings, and notes that some woman has given R. some roses for his office. Chapter 8 ("Guilia Lazzari"): After several exchanges of letters with Guilia Lazzari, the Indian freedom fighter falls into the trap but commits suicide with poison; Guilia Lazzari asks for her dead lover's watch, a gift which had cost her 12 pounds; this is a very good chapter. Chapters 9 and 10 form a loose unit. Chapter 9 ("Gustav"): Gustav is a Swiss businessman who was writing model reports for the British--only they were totally worthless, since he never left home to get information; Ashenden gives him a small assignment: get information about a Brit living in Switzerland who is working for the Germans. Chapter 10 ("The Traitor"): Ashenden, claiming to be an ill member of the Censorship Department, makes the acquaintance of the Brit who is a traitor (and his German wife and ugly little dog); the German spymaster falls for the bait and sends the traitor back to England to work in that department; instead, the traitor is executed (I wondered why, instead, he was not given false information to feed to the German spymaster); this is a long and well-written chapter, showing some of the complexity of a few people and closing with a sad scene of the traitor's wife realizing that her husband is dead, when the man's dog howls as she leaves the post office with no letter from him. Chapters 11, 12, and 13 form a loose unit. Chapter 11 ("Behind the Scenes"): Ashenden is sent to a country herein called "X" to stay in touch with people who might start a revolution; while there he learns that the American ambassador is miffed that the British ambassador has not sat down with him over a drink to discuss matters; Ashenden passes this tip to the British ambassador, who is grateful and asks Ashenden to come dine with him; this is a very short chapter; in what seems a subordinate manner, a Galician Pole who helps Ashenden is mentioned (this man will be a central figure in chapt. 13). Chapter 12 ("His Excellency"): In a long chapter, the British ambassador tells Ashenden about his love affair with a coarse, ignorant female acrobat (whom he sometimes beat up) before his marriage, and his life-long regret that he broke it off and married a woman he did not love; some of these details are as vivid as those of Philip's infatuation with Mildred in Maugham's novel OF HUMAN BONDAGE, but what place does this tangential material have in a book about espionage during WW I? Chapter 13 ("The Flip of a Coin"): Ashenden, walking to meet the Galician Pole mentioned in chapter 11 about a mission to blow up a German munitions factory and its many Polish civilian workers, looks up at the "frosty stars"; when he meets the man, he cannot think clearly enough to make a decision and, after pondering the cosmic futility of men's lives--his own and the British ambassador's included--he abdicates responsibility and tosses a coin to "decide" whether the mission goes ahead or not; we are not told which way the coin landed: in one sense, an Unsolvable Puzzle is created by this chapter's ending; however, this chapter probably is an instance of "Didactic Fiction" about the nature and purpose of "Life." Chapters 14, 15, and 16 form a final loose unit. Chapter 14 ("A Chance Acquaintance"): Ashenden, on a new mission in Russia, travels with an American businessman who talks constantly during their 11-day train ride across Russia; this seems to have little direct connection with the plot pertaining to espionage. Chapter 15 ("Love and Russian Literature"): The narrator makes self-conconscious reference to "these stories" and the characterization thus far of Ashenden, indicating that Ashenden has a "tender" side that has not yet been represented; Ashenden's brief love affair with a married Russian woman (5 years before the Russian Revolution) is recounted in a silly satiric manner; they went to Paris to test whether they would be compatible, and she, who ate scrambled eggs every morning, told him yes, but he, who detested those eggs, escaped to New York instead; the structural point of this long digression is solely to introduce this woman. Chapter 16 ("Mr. Harrington's Washing"): Ashenden's mission fails when the Bolsheviks take control; the talkative American, Mr. Harrington, insists on getting his washing before leaving the city and is found lying dead on a street by the Russian woman and Ashenden, still clutching his laundry; this ending seems to be an attempt to create a feeling of pathos in readers, but for me it does not succeed. As I remarked above, this book is very loosely organized, almost never suspenseful, and suffers from a major quality-control problem: although a few passages are really excellent, many parts are very long-winded and seem out of place in an espionage book; many others (including several whole chapters) seem like padding. However, Maugham DOES have a good vocabulary, and most readers would do well to keep a large dictionary nearby.
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