The Painted Veil

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The film is fantastic but the book is better. While this is a story of a doomed relationship, I would contest that the setting of a cholera outbreak, and one man's heroic fight to contain it, makes this a medical classic. Kitty was a promising debutante at 18 but an increasing embarrassment at 25, causing her match making and ambitious mother great frustration and when younger sister gets engaged, she is close to desperation. Never hurting for suitors, just never the right one, she chooses Walter, a young biologist stationed in Hong Kong, as this seems the perfect solution to her dilemma.

Kitty's work at the convent changes her personality. She sees her former acts of selfishness and attempts to make amends for them, apologizing to Walter for her affair. The situation is complicated further when she realizes she is pregnant. The Painted Veil' is set in England and China, taking place in the 1920's. It is a story of love, betrayal, revenge and redemption. I definitely wasn't prepared for some of the twists and turns that this story took, but I enjoyed every minute. That was as far as the plot was based on the fith canto of the Inferno. The title was derived from an unfinished sonnet of Shelley: Lift not the painted veil which those who live call Life Delirium. Or perhaps it was the last line of Goldsmith's elegy that she hadn't read yet somehow knew! If only she could cry for Walter like the stupid, round-faced coolies!

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. FROM THE BLURB: Less known than his masterpiece Of Human Bondage, this 1925 Somerset Maugham novel rips at your emotions with its portrayal of an adulterous wife. When the bacteriologist husband of Kitty Fane learns of her infidelity, he forces her to accompany him into the festering center of a Chinese cholera epidemic.The author explained in the foreword that the book was based on a story, rather than characters. While living in Italy and receiving Italian lessons, his tutor, Ersilia, introduced him to the fifth canto of the inferno. La Pia: Ante-Purgatory, Purgatorio 5 In the words of Mark Twain: “Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it” Maugham was intrigued by the idea of a jilted husband who forced his wife into a dangerous situation, and what the woman might experience there. In writing The Painted Veil, he decided to bring this story into a modern setting and change the ending.

Unlike his wife, Walter has no illusions. He knew that Kitty didn't love him the way he loved her, but he wanted her so badly that he was willing to marry her anyway. He may have known that she didn't love him, but he did expect for her to be faithful. How does Somerset Maugham do it? Why do I see all these people so clearly, and understand them all in different ways? Why do they all make sense, and yet they fail? Ability? What nonsense! He's a very stupid man. He gives you the impression that he dashes off his work and gets it through from sheer brilliancy. Nothing of the kind. He's as industrious as a Eurasian clerk."

Kitty Fane is a beautiful, vain, upper-class British woman unhappily married to Walter Fane, a bacteriologist working in Hong Kong. She is conducting an affair with Charles Townsend, the Assistant Colonial Secretary, and the two are in her room when the knobs to her door mysteriously turn from the outside. Walter would depart their bungalow early each morning and come home late, leaving Kitty to indulge her overwrought fantasies. How she longed to die and yet to live! But as the days passed she began to spend more time with Waddington exploring the village, and found herself reaching a new level of understanding. How shallow she had been up till now! The ending was sad, darnit, I was beyond grieving, but accepted the realism of it. And it was positive. Unfortunately, out of the initial 8000 copies, 4000 had already been disseminated and needed to be recollected. Yet 74 copies —most of which were review copies— still remain in existence, making up this practically unobtainable first issue of the First English Edition. Thus, the preface (Fig 1) of this second Heinemann issue, where Maugham revealed the intricacies of having used certain names, was kept in all subsequent versions of the book.

First published to a storm of protest, The Painted Veilis a classic story of a woman's spiritual awakening. Itis a beautifully written affirmation of the human capacity to grow, to change, and to forgive. The Painted Veil brings the quiet pleasures of a fine novel, showing us that the world’s complicated geography is no match for the terrain of the human heart.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.

When Walter confronted her, he gave her an ultimatum. Either to go with him to Meitan-fu, a cholera region where an epidemic broke out, the worst one in fifty years, or he files for a divorce. The condition was that Charles Townsend, her lover should confirm in writing that he would divorce his wife and marry Kitty, with Charles's wife confirming in writing that she will divorce Charles. If Walter's conditions were not met, Kitty would have to accompany him on his journey to avoid a scandal. Walter: 'I’m afraid you’ve thought me a bigger fool than I am.’ She did not quite know what to say. She was undecided whether indignantly to assert her innocence or to break out into angry reproaches. He seemed to read her thoughts... I know Walters. Those cold and passionate introverted and unforgiving correct people who will do everything right and remain impossible to belong to. If he had been different ... but he wasn't and that is the problem.

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The denouement is not what you think. This is a lovestory and not a lovestory. It's about love and all its definitions. And for me, it was a tribute to the role of different kind of men playing a role in a woman's life. However, in this second issue (Fig 2), Maugham cleverly adapted these location names and henceforth referred to them as ‘Tching-Yen’, ‘Pleasant Valley’, ‘The Mount’ and ‘Lushan’ respectively. All references to ‘Canton’ (Guangzhou) have also been removed due to its proximity to Hong Kong. Even though Maugham had changed the names to avoid allegations, he later admitted in 1934 that he was indeed inspired by the events witnessed during his voyage to China, which directly led to the creation of this book and raises the question of whether this kind of censorship was necessary at all. He gave his wife a choice, divorce, which would mean the end of her career as a socialite with pretty party dresses, passionate lovers and invitations to all the best balls in town. Or, if she could persuade her married lover to divorce his wife, he would allow that. But the married lover, typical of the species ditched the paramour and kept the wife. So it was either the social ignominy of divorce or she could go with him, a doctor, to sort out a cholera epidemic on mainland China where she might catch and die of the disease herself. She went.