The House of Doors: Longlisted for the Booker Prize 2023

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The House of Doors: Longlisted for the Booker Prize 2023

The House of Doors: Longlisted for the Booker Prize 2023

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Ai, that’s not funny, Bernard,’ his wife said. ‘Coincidentally, our GP in the dorp disappeared that same morning,’ Bernard continued. ‘Left his wife behind. Neither hair nor hide of him has ever been seen again.’ How perfectly this house seemed to reflect the story being told. No direct way through it but one that is navigated step by step. The heart of the story is told by Lesley each evening in retrospect as she tells it to Maugham over their evening drinks alone in the garden. She reveals secrets no one else has ever known and the reader listens along with Maugham to her beautiful but heart-breaking story.

Change the plan you will roll onto at any time during your trial by visiting the “Settings & Account” section. What happens at the end of my trial? Funder reveals how O’Shaughnessy Blair self-effacingly supported Orwell intellectually, emotionally, medically and financially ... why didn’t Orwell do the same for his wife in her equally serious time of need?’In The House of Doors we meet Lesley and her husband - two expats living a pampered life who welcome a visitor, the famous author W."Willie" Somerset Maugham. Willie arrives with his secretary lover Gerald and in his two weeks stay upend the status quo,

Lesley says: “The vastness, the emptiness of Karoo countryside made me want to weep when we first moved here. Everything was so bleak — the land, the light, the faces of the people.I was a child of the equator, Born under monsoon skies; I pined for the cloying humanity of Penang”. Maugham, one of the great novelists of his day, is beleaguered: Having long hidden his homosexuality, his unhappy and expensive marriage of convenience becomes unbearable after he loses his savings-and the freedom to travel with Gerald. His career deflating, his health failing, Maugham arrives at Cassowary House in desperate need of a subject for his next book. Lesley, too, is enduring a marriage more duplicitous than it first appears. Maugham suspects an affair, and, learning of Lesley's past connection to the Chinese revolutionary, Dr. Sun Yat Sen, decides to probe deeper. But as their friendship grows and Lesley confides in him about life in the Straits, Maugham discovers a far more surprising tale than he imagined, one that involves not only war and scandal but the trial of an Englishwoman charged with murder. It is, to Maugham, a story worthy of fiction. s Penang is where we meet our protagonist Lesley Hamlyn. Her husband Robert is a lawyer, and it’s fair to say that they live a very comfortable life, mixing in the very highest circles.Oh, that’s just Monty,’ said Robert. ‘He showed up here a few years ago. Takes his daily dip in the Warburtons’ pool next door. So what’s on the cards today, old chap? Lesley’ll be delighted to show you the sights.’ It begins and ends in Doornfontein, South Africa in 1947.... with Lesley Hamlin as our narrator. She and Robert moved into a modest bungalow on the property of Robert’s cousin, Bernard, who was a sheep farmer. It was an adjustment for Lesley and Robert …… An angry, powerful book seething with love and outrage for a community too often stereotyped or ignored. At one point, Lesley mentions to Willie that all his stories seem to be about unhappy marriages. Certainly, because of the stigma of divorce, couples stayed married regardless of their happiness and often sought out affairs instead. This plays out in this book as well. You would think with all the various love affairs and high emotions, the story would have been livelier. But sad to say, it came across as dry and lifeless to me. Within these layers of the storyline are many different strands. There is the intrigue of the murder trial, insight into Maugham’s life and Sun Yat Sen’s, and the lives of Europeans, Straits Chinese, Malays and others in Penang at this time. The writing is excellent, although I occasionally found descriptive passages a little overdone and convoluted, and it held my interest completely throughout. I thoroughly enjoyed it and the only reason it’s not a 5 star read for me is due to very minor issues such as this.

Tan Twan Eng's brilliantly written book uses historical and narrative drama to create memorable characters seemingly straight out of Somerset Maugham's playbook. Maugham, known as "Willie," with his partner Gerald, shows up in Penang to visit his good friend Robert, a barrister. Robert's wife, Lesley has a penchant for a local artist who has created a house of doors, and Robert, as it turns out, is having an affair with a local man. Lesley also has an interest in Sun Yat Sen and his political trials. Sen was revered by both the Communist Party in China and by the Nationalist Party in Taiwan, and Lesley is definitely an admirer.The Telegraph values your comments but kindly requests all posts are on topic, constructive and respectful. Please review our Tan’s storytelling is perfectly poised, moving between first-person narration by Lesley and a third-person account that follows Maugham. Lesley is a subtly portrayed society hostess whose identity is conditioned by her deep attachment to Penang. Born and brought up in the area, she speaks fluent Malay and claims to have no intention of moving, even as she is gently encouraged to relocate to a drier climate for the sake of Robert’s worsening lung condition. They currently have none other than famous novelist and old friend of Robert’s, W. Somerset Maugham (whom they affectionately call Willie) staying with them. It’s based on true events. It’s a work of fiction; yet it features characters and events drawn from history…a murder in 1911 which Eng set in 1910 to coincide with Sun Yat-Sen’s extended stay in Penang. His new book revolves around a couple’s friendship with author and playwright William Somerset Maugham, set in the 1920s and orbiting the imperial dynasty of China and the unease of Empire.



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