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Vacances de Noël (1939)

par W. Somerset Maugham

Autres auteurs: Voir la section autres auteur(e)s.

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513647,412 (3.6)8
At the age of twenty-three, Charlie Mason is endowed with good looks, good manners and a happy disposition. Following three years at Cambridge and one in his father's business, he is now looking forward to a jaunt in Paris with Simon Fenimore, his oldest friend.Yet Paris is not what he expects. And in just a few days his young eyes are opened to the horror and ugly drama of its underworld.Published before the outbreak of war in 1939, Maugham's purpose in Christmas Holiday was to warn the complacent, insular British middle-class of the immense upheavals taking place on the Continent.… (plus d'informations)
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Para el joven inglés Charley Mason, la estancia de cinco días en París que le han regalado sus padres no será la celebración que él esperaba, sino un interludio inquietante en su vida, una experiencia reveladora que desestabilizará su corazón y su privilegiada vida familiar en el marco histórico de la Europa de entreguerras. Charley se reúne en París con Simon, periodista y amigo de la infancia. En el cabaret Sérail, Charley conoce a la Princesa Olga, mote de una enigmática joven rusa llamada Lydia, quien lo conmueve con la historia de su vida, su orfandad, su pobreza y su irracional devoción a un marido convicto. Por un breve tiempo, la segura, respetable y cómoda existencia de Charley se verá afectada por la de aquellos que no han disfrutado de tales bendiciones. Sus «vacaciones» en París harán que cambie para siempre.
  Natt90 | Jan 24, 2023 |
Christmas Holiday. W.Somerset Maugham. 1939. Discovering a Maugham novel I didn’t know about has been a treat. It is certainly not one of his best, but is it Maugham and it does take place in Paris. Charley Mason is a young, bright, handsome, upper middle-class young Englishman whose father gives him a week in Paris at Christmas as a reward for his hard work in the family business. Charley meets his boyhood friend Simon who has become harsh and sarcastic, and reveals that he is no longer a communist as he has realized communism like democracy and socialism are failed systems. Even though he doesn’t call himself one, Simon has become a nihilist. Charley simply cannot comprehend why Simon despises his fellow man. Simon introduces Charley to a prostitute, a Russian émigré who fled from the aftermath of the revolution. Charley ends up spending his entire holiday with Lydia. Lydia was married to a notorious murderer and drug dealer and was horribly manipulated by her husband and her mother-in-law. Just as he could not understand Simon, Charley could not understand why Lydia maintained her love for her husband and refused to leave her self-destructive life as a prostitute. Charley left Paris eager to get back to his “real” London life. Once home he realized he would never be the same. No one can skewer the middle class like Maugham! I am so glad I found this book. It makes me want to go back and re-read more of his works ( )
  judithrs | Jan 6, 2021 |
[Preface to The Selected Novels, Vol. 3, Heinemann, 1953:]

Christmas Holiday came about by accident. I was spending some weeks in Paris during the thirties and one day I happened to read in the papers that a young man called Guy Davin was coming up for a trial on a charge of murder. The murder, a peculiarly callous and brutal one, had excited the morbid interest of the public. I had never been to a criminal trial in France and was curious to attend one. I had a friend then who was the owner and editor of a weekly paper with a large circulation and with his help by means of some trickery I managed to get myself smuggled into court among the reporters.

[...]

I found the experience, so new to me, immensely thrilling. There was no doubt about the prisoner’s guilt. The evidence was damning. The only question was whether he would be sentenced to death, or whether the jury would admit extenuating circumstances, in which case by law the judges could only sentence him to a term of penal servitude. There was a long string of witnesses and they were allowed to deliver themselves at length. The prisoner, little more than a boy, was well-dressed and nice-looking, dapper and vain. Before the judges entered on the first morning of the trial the photographers had asked him to stand up so that they could take better pictures of him and he had preened himself before them with insolent satisfaction. He came of good bourgeois stock. His father, who was dead, had been a general in the Army, and his mother, a typical French woman of her class, was obviously of the utmost respectability. Even before she took her place on the witness stand you had only to look at her to know what her life had been. She had passed the greater part of it in one garrison town after another, and as her husband rose in rank she took the deference the wives of her husband’s subordinates showed her as her due. She ran her successive establishments with competence and strict economy. She performed her religious duties punctiliously. On stated occasions she paid and received the visits which her position required of her. She knew her son was guilty and at best would be parted from her for many years, but she delivered her testimony with precision. Her dignity impressed the court. One wondered whether she had ever asked herself why God had given her, who had always done her duty, a son who had brought upon her ageing head such a terrible disgrace. People are very strange and have fantastic notions. One wondered whether she thought bitterly that after this the widows of her husband’s brother officers would no longer pay their visits of ceremony and that, and if she ventured to call on them, their doors would be closed to her.

From her testimony and from that of others it became evident that the prisoner had from an early age been a scamp. He was dissolute, extravagant and dishonest. For one of his escapades he had been sentenced to a short term of imprisonment. The prisoner’s wife took the stand. She was a pretty little thing, very plainly dressed, a Russian, and she spoke French with a slight accent. She was very nervous and spoke in so low a tone that it was hard to hear what she said. Now and then her voice was choked with sobs and once she broke down altogether. One got the impression that she loved her husband, but had found life with the worthless creature she had married and his prim, conventional mother, for the three of them lived together, far from easy. She was a deeply pathetic figure. The prisoner was found guilty, but, for what reason I do not know, extenuating circumstances were allowed, perhaps because the bookmaker he had murdered for a few thousand francs was a disreputable character, perhaps because of his father’s distinguished war record, and he was given a life sentence.
  WSMaugham | Jun 13, 2015 |
W. Somerset Maugham
Christmas Holiday
Published 1939.

The first thing you need to know about W. Somerset Maugham’s Christmas Holiday is that it has nothing to do with Christmas.

The book was written in 1939 when Maugham was 63. It is one of his last major pieces.

Christmas Holiday tells the story of Charley Mason, a comfortably-born 24-year old, who spends a week-long holiday in Paris. (Yes, it is at Christmas.)

Charley’s father has given him the vacation and is expecting him to sow his oats a bit but this does not happen. The story that unfolds is like a set of Russian matryoshka dolls. First there’s Charley, then Charley’s cynical friend Simon, then the Russian woman he meets through Simon, Lydia, and finally Lydia’s imprisoned husband Robert Berger, who we never meet but know a fair amount about.

These people are all without the advantages Charley has in life and live an opportunistic, amoral, but passionate existence. Charley’s life, on the other hand is calculated, detached, and formulaic.

The book seems to have heavy autobiographical influences with Maugham representing himself in Charley. Charley, like Maugham is comfortably born, both have spent time in Paris, and both were encouraged into a profession that did not suit them. In Maugham’s case is was medicine, in Charley’s case it was accounting. At one point Maugham describes Charley as “taking to it as a duck to water” which is how he described his own transition from doctor to novelist.

Maugham was a homosexual and Charley never has sex with Lydia, even though they spent a week in the same hotel room and she is in the profession.

At a broader level, Charley (the Englishman) in the book is disabused of the protected naïve life he lives, well-ordered, controlled and unemotional. When it is all over and Charley returns home to England things seem just as they were a week earlier, but Charley has changed forever.

Maugham may have been making a broader characterization about the British in general. Published in 1939, the British were naïve about Hitler and what was happening on the continent. After all, Prime Minister Chamberlain had just returned (30 September 1938) from Munich proclaiming “Peace in our time.”

The characters:
Charley Mason. 24-year old comfortably born Englishman goes to Paris for a week.
Simon Fenimore. Charley’s schoolboy friend, cynic, anarchist, manipulator. Ignores Charley except to set him up with “Princess Olga”
Lydia. Russian prostitute who Charley meets at the Serail and is introduced as “Princess Olga.” Married to Robert Berger the rake, she atones for his sins by debasing herself.
Robert Berger. Imprisoned husband of Lydia, drug dealer, unscrupulous, deceitful and manipulative. Unworthy of love, but loved by Lydia all the same.

Some fun vocabulary words:
sempstress n. var. seamstress.
comely adj. good-looking, pleasing in appearance; exceedingly attractive in an overtly secual way.
corpulence n. fatness, portliness esp of body. ( )
  ldmarquet | Dec 27, 2012 |
The opening scene: Charley Mason - a twenty three year old British college grad who has recently taken an office job in the family business, is embarking on an all expense paid holiday vacation to Paris - a Christmas gift from his proud parents. Charley is an idealist; carefree and innocent. His financial security and sheltered upbringing were always protection against any pain or suffering. To this date he has viewed life through rose tinted glasses.

But, this doesn’t turn out to be the joyous adventure his parents expected. In fact, not in Charley’s wildest imagination could he have envisioned the events that occur in this classic 1930’s Maugham drama.

The main attraction of this trip for Charley is the fact that his oldest childhood friend, Simon, is now residing in Paris. Simon was a poor lonely orphan with big hopes and dreams, and a burning hunger for success. In spite of the contrasting personalities and different backgrounds, Simon and Charley became friends. And against his parents wishes, they remained friends. But their reunion is not what Charley expects. Now Simon is a successful journalist with his eye on a political career. Simon has become a cynical realist; a wanna-be revolutionary, angry, bitter, and filled with scorn for the establishment. And to make things even more interesting, as a practical joke, Simon introduces Charley to a young Russian prostitute who’s husband is serving life in prison for murder.

The vacation takes on a nightmarish quality as Charley views first hand the stark reality of poverty, the pain and despair of loneliness, and the dark side of human nature.

Maugham cleverly draws on the sharp contrast between the upper class landed gentry of European society, and the poor immigrants and struggling lower class blue collar workers. He symbolically uses art and music to demonstrate the depth of emotion felt by those who suffer. And in spite of the fact that this was an old fashioned dated drama it held my interest. Maugham was a pro at character development, dialog, and story telling. ( )
2 voter LadyLo | Jan 2, 2012 |
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Nom de l'auteurRôleType d'auteurŒuvre ?Statut
W. Somerset Maughamauteur principaltoutes les éditionscalculé
Birdsall, DerekConcepteur de la couvertureauteur secondairequelques éditionsconfirmé
Peccinotti, HarriCover photographauteur secondairequelques éditionsconfirmé
Ridley, ChristopherCover photographauteur secondairequelques éditionsconfirmé
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At the age of twenty-three, Charlie Mason is endowed with good looks, good manners and a happy disposition. Following three years at Cambridge and one in his father's business, he is now looking forward to a jaunt in Paris with Simon Fenimore, his oldest friend.Yet Paris is not what he expects. And in just a few days his young eyes are opened to the horror and ugly drama of its underworld.Published before the outbreak of war in 1939, Maugham's purpose in Christmas Holiday was to warn the complacent, insular British middle-class of the immense upheavals taking place on the Continent.

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