Ashenden, Or: The British AgentThis fascinating book contains probably the most expert stories of espionage ever written. For a period of time after it was first published, the book became official required reading for persons entering the British Secret Service. During World War I, Maugham enlisted with an ambulance unit, but was soon shifted to the Intelligence Department. Although these stories were based on the author's own experiences as a British agent during the war, he emphasized that they were written purely as entertainment, at which, indeed, Ashenden succeeds. Maugham's clarity of style, the perfection of his form, the subtlety of his thought, veiled thinly behind a worldly cynicism, has made him an international figure. |
From inside the book
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He asked O'Malley if that was her natural voice and O'Malley said she had had it
as long as ever he had known her. He called it a whisky voice. He told her what—
Brown said about it and she gave him a smile of her wide mouth and said it ...
“During that dinner at the little restaurant off the Boul' Mich' she had mentioned
that her troupe was going to London in the spring and in one of his letters to O'
Malley he slipped in casually a phrase to the effect that if his young friend Alix ...
He thought of O'Malley too, and of Yvonne. She must have told them and it galled
him to think that people whom in his heart he despised should laugh at him
behind his back. Do you think he was very contemptible P” “Good gracious, no,”
said ...
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LibraryThing Review
User Review - lamour - LibraryThingThis is volume three of Maugham's collected short stories. In this volume he has put his stories that have the same protagonist, Ashendan who is recruited to move to Switzerland where he will be a ... Read full review
LibraryThing Review
User Review - jimgysin - LibraryThingIt's easy to see why this one is considered an archetype of espionage fiction. The fact that the book was first published back in the late 1920s means that some of the dialogue and narrative will ... Read full review
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Bibliographic information
| Title | Ashenden, Or: The British Agent Volume 5 of Collected edition of the works of W. Somerset Maugham Short story index reprint series |
| Author | William Somerset Maugham |
| Edition | reprint |
| Publisher | Doubleday, Doran, 1941 |
| Original from | the University of California |
| Digitized | 23 May 2009 |
| ISBN | 0836940520, 9780836940527 |
| Length | 304 pages |
| Subjects | › Fiction / General |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |