What most husbands expect as a right I was prepared to receive as a favor. Desperate for love and eager for experience of a wider world, Philip Carey grows up in the oppressive confines of his uncles vicarage.

I tried not to bore you with my love I knew I couldn't afford to do that and I was always on the lookout for the first sign that you were impatient with my affection. I was thankful to be allowed to love you and I was enraptured when now and then I thought you were pleased with me or when I noticed in your eyes a gleam of good-humored affection. It is the story of Philip Carey, an orphan eager for life, love and adventure. I never expected you to love me, I didn't see any reason that you should. Of Human Bondage is the first and most autobiographical of Maughams novels. Most people, as far as I can see, when they're in love with someone and the love isn't returned feel that they have a grievance. I knew that you'd only married me for convenience. I knew how frightened you were of intelligence and I did everything I could to make you think me as big a fool as the rest of the men you knew. It's comic when I think how hard I tried to be amused by the things that amused you and how anxious I was to hide from you that I wasn't ignorant and vulgar and scandal-mongering and stupid. In the weeks before the war began, Maugham had been completing his novel Of Human Bondage, a Bildungsroman with substantial autobiographical elements.

I knew that your aims and ideals were vulgar and commonplace. Often described as a bildungsroman, the novel chronicles.

'I knew you were silly and frivolous and empty-headed. Of Human Bondage is arguably Maugham's most popular work and has steadily gained readers and influence since its publication in 1915.

Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham