page_title: Somerset Maugham
section_title: Portraits
hierarchical_section_title: Somerset Maugham / Portraits
caption_attribution_description: English: Caricature of British novelist W. Somerset Maugham
context_page_description: William Somerset Maugham CH was an English playwright, novelist, and short story writer. He was among the most popular writers of his era and reputedly the highest-paid author during the 1930s.
  Both Maugham's parents died before he was 10, and the orphaned boy was raised by a paternal uncle who was emotionally cold. He did not want to become a lawyer like other men in his family, so he trained and qualified as a physician. His first novel Liza of Lambeth sold out so rapidly that Maugham gave up medicine to write full-time.
  During the First World War, he served with the Red Cross and in the ambulance corps before being recruited in 1916 into the British Secret Intelligence Service. He worked for the service in Switzerland and Russia before the October Revolution of 1917 in the Russian Empire. During and after the war, he travelled in India, Southeast Asia and the Pacific. He drew from those experiences in his later short stories and novels.
context_section_description: Many portraits were painted of Somerset Maugham, including that by Graham Sutherland in the Tate Gallery, and several by Sir Gerald Kelly. Sutherland's portrait was included in the exhibition Painting the Century: 101 Portrait Masterpieces 1900–2000 at the National Portrait Gallery.
caption: Maugham was the subject of this caricature by David Low.
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