He often entertained literary figures like Sinclair Lewis, Theodore Dreiser, Aldous Huxley, Ferenc Molnár, and close friend Somerset Maugham, as well.

Maugham's masterpiece is generally agreed to be Of Human Bondage, a semiautobiographical novel that deals with the life of the main character Philip Carey, who, like Maugham, was orphaned, and brought up by his pious uncle.

Another daughter, Gwendolyn Maud Syrie ( 1879 – 1955 ), known as Syrie like her mother, was married to wealthy businessman Henry Wellcome, and later to the writer Somerset Maugham, and became a socially prominent London interior designer in the 1920s and 1930s.

American studios soon followed with films like Quartet ( 1948 ) based on stories by W. Somerset Maugham.

Some notable guests of the past included Empress Elisabeth of Austria ( Sisi ) and the German Emperor Wilhelm I with his chancellor Otto von Bismarck as well as Tsar Ferdinand I of Bulgaria, King Faisal I of Iraq, King Ibn Saud of Saudi Arabia and Iran's last king Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, industrialists like Wilhelm von Opel and artists like Heinrich Mann, Robert Stolz and W. Somerset Maugham.

In A Fragment of Autobiography, Maugham claimed not to have read Crowley's review, adding, " I daresay it was a pretty piece of vituperation, but probably, like his poems, intolerably verbose.

W. Somerset Maugham, who wrote over a hundred short stories, was one of the most popular authors of his time.

The first prize was publication by Harper and Hughes garnered widespread critical acclaim with the book's release in September 1957, winning a Somerset Maugham Award.

Maugham had begun collecting theatrical paintings before the First World War and continued to the point where his collection was second only to that of the Garrick Club.

Maugham was one of the most significant travel writers of the inter-war years, and can be compared with contemporaries such as Evelyn Waugh and Freya Stark.

George Orwell said that Maugham was " the modern writer who has influenced me the most.

Maugham was the subject of this caricature by David Low ( cartoonist ) | David Low.

Her second book, A Way of Looking, won the Somerset Maugham award and marked a turning point, as the prize money allowed her to spend nearly three months in Rome, which was a revelation.

Somerset Maugham considered it a great novel, although he found David the weakest character in it, unworthy of the real Dickens, praising Mr Mickawber, who " never fails ", and considered that Little Em ' ly got what she was asking for.

The book was twice adapted into film, first in 1946 starring Tyrone Power and Gene Tierney, and Herbert Marshall as Maugham, and then a 1984 adaptation starring Bill Murray.

Maugham ’ s suggestion that he " invented nothing " was a source of annoyance for Christopher Isherwood, who helped him translate a verse 1. 3. 14 from the Katha Upanishads for the novel ’ s epigraph-उत ् त ि ष ् ठ ज ा ग ् रत प ् र ा प ् य वर ा न ् न ि ब ो धत | क ् ष ु रस ् य ध ा र ा न ि श ि त ा द ु रत ् यय ा द ु र ् ग ं पथस ् तत ् कवय ो वदन ् त ि || ( uttiShTha jAgrata prApya varAn_nibodhata | kShurasya dhArA nihitA duratyayA pathas_tat_-avayo vadanti || )-which means " Rise, awaken, seek the wise and realize.

In 1915, Of Human Bondage, by W. Somerset Maugham, was published.

The most successful playwright of the era was W. Somerset Maugham.

Her next project was Sadie Thompson, a Vernon Duke / Howard Dietz musical adaptation of a W. Somerset Maugham short story, but Merman found she was unable to retain the lyrics and resigned twelve days after rehearsals began.

Beginning in the early 1920s, Cooper was winning praise in plays by W. Somerset Maugham and others.

Her last major success on the stage was at age 82, in 1970 – 71 in the role of Mrs. St. Maugham in Enid Bagnold's The Chalk Garden, a role she had created on Broadway and in the West End in 1955 – 56.

The film was based on the short story " Rain " by author W. Somerset Maugham and the 1923 play of the same name by John Colton and Clemence Randolph.

At the first meeting, Swanson suggested a film based on the John Colton and Clemence Randolph play Rain ( 1923 ) which in turn was based on the story by W. Somerset Maugham titled Miss Thompson ( 1921 ).

The film was adapted by Monta Bell, Mort Blumenstock, Jean de Limur and Garrett Fort from the 1927 play The Letter by W. Somerset Maugham.

Somerset Maugham, in his short story " The Round Dozen " ( 1924, also known as " The Ardent Bigamist ") observes: " I remember Miss Broughton telling me once that when she was young people said her books were fast and when she was old they said they were slow, and it was very hard since she had written exactly the same sort of book for forty years ".

* Then and Now by W. Somerset Maugham

Examples are Ashenden or: the British Agent ( 1928 ) by W. Somerset Maugham, about counter-revolutionary British espionage against Bolshevik Russia, and The Mystery of Tunnel 51 ( 1928 ) by Alexander Wilson whose novels conveyed an uncanny portrait of the first head of the Secret Intelligence Service, Mansfield Smith-Cumming, the original ' C '.

Maugham said that many of his short stories were inspired by accounts he heard during his travels in the outposts of the Empire.

Influenced by the published journals of the French writer Jules Renard, which Maugham had often enjoyed for their conscientiousness, wisdom and wit, Maugham published selections from his own journals under the title A Writer's Notebook in 1949.

Although these journal selections are, by nature, episodic and of varying quality, they range over more than 50 years of the writer's life and contain much that Maugham scholars and admirers find of interest.

Many portraits were painted of Somerset Maugham, including that by Graham Sutherland in the Tate Gallery, and several by Sir Gerald Kelly.

* Works by W. Somerset Maugham at LibriVox ( audiobooks )

* " The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham " – A Biography of Somerset Maugham by Selina Hastings.

* Of Human Bondage by Somerset Maugham is published

After I, Claudius, he and the ex-patriate German film producer Erich Pommer founded the production company Mayflower Pictures in the UK, which produced three films starring Laughton: Vessel of Wrath ( US Title The Beachcomber ) ( 1938 ), based on a story by W. Somerset Maugham, in which his wife Elsa Lanchester co-starred ; St. Martin's Lane ( US Title Sidewalks of London ), about London street entertainers, which featured Vivien Leigh and Rex Harrison ; and Jamaica Inn, with Maureen O ' Hara and Robert Newton, about Cornish smugglers, based on Daphne du Maurier's novel, and the last film Alfred Hitchcock directed in Britain before moving to Hollywood in the late 1930s.

* The Letter ( play ), a 1927 drama by W. Somerset Maugham from his own short story of the same name

* The Letter ( 1929 film ), directed by Jean de Limur starring Jeanne Eagels, adapted from the Somerset Maugham play

** The Letter ( 1940 film ), directed by William Wyler starring Bette Davis, also adapted from the Somerset Maugham play

* The Letter ( opera ), a 2009 opera to be presented by the Santa Fe Opera and based on the 1927 play by W. Somerset Maugham

Adaptations of classic foreign plays included Beethoven by Louis Parker, an adaptation of the play by Réné Fauchois ( 1909 ); A Russian Tragedy, an English version by Henry Hamilton of the play by Adolph Glass ( 1909 ); and The Perfect Gentleman by W. Somerset Maugham, an adaptation of the classic Molière play, Le bourgeois gentilhomme ( 1913 ).

In the first half of the 20th century it was frequented by artists and writers, including Pablo Picasso, Henri Matisse, Edith Wharton, Somerset Maugham and Aldous Huxley, as well as wealthy Americans and Europeans.