The Vagrant Mood - W. Somerset Maugham

Published by Vintage Books, 2001, softcover, 199 pages, condition: very good.

The Vagrant Mood is a brilliantly varied and colourful collection of essays. From Kant to Raymond Chandler; from the legend of Zurbaran to the art of the detective story; from Burke to Augustus Hare, Somerset Maugham brings his inimitable mastery of the incisive character sketch to the genre of literary criticism.

A collection of commentaries on an eclectic range of subjects, ranging from Emanuel Kant to the lesser known Spanish painter Zurbaran. Not everything were on the same level of interest to me, the essays I enjoyed most were Augustus, The Decline and Fall of the Detective Story and his reflections on Edmund Burke. His reflections on a good detective story were particularly interesting. Of less interest were Zurbaran and the final piece, Some novelists I have known.

Somerset Maugham puts forth his remarks and onions in a lucid and logical manner. He writes writes beautiful English, these essays were a pleasure to read.