“… the painted veil which those who live call Life.”
I saw a preview last week for Edward Norton's new movie, The Painted Veil. The movie looks fantastic, a sweeping romantic period piece. a type that I just love. Then the next day at a favorite bookstore sitting there on the table in front of me was a copy of The Painted Veil by W. Somerset Maugham, first published in 1925.
Maugham (1874-1965) was an English playwright, novelist and short story writer who traveled the globe using the exotic locals as backdrops to his work. This was the 2004 reprint, the cover a beautiful painting of a woman holding a bird cage casually in one hand. There is something so captivating about her face, especially the look in her eyes. So I bought the book.
The Painted Veil is not only a story of Kitty and her ill-fated marriage to bacteriologist Walter Fane, but of her own personal growth as a human being. Kitty was raised by her mother to do one thing in life, marry young and well. When her younger sister announces her own engagement Kitty, who has already passed up several offers of marriage, accepts Walter Fane’s proposal for her own very selfish reasons.
Right from the start you know that Kitty does not love Walter, barely even likes him, and views him as a way of escape from the thought of being an old maid, as well as her mother's bitterness. Kitty is selfish and often unkind to the man so madly in love with her. She pities Walter and often despises him because of his love for her.
But still Kitty moves from England to the British colony of Hong Kong, where she soaks up the attention that is given to a new bride. But when the shine starts to wear off and Kitty discovers that being the wife of a bacteriologist isn’t as glamorous as she had hoped she finds other things to occupy her time.
When Walter learns of Kitty’s adulterous affair with Charles Townsend, an official in the Hong Kong colony, he gives her two choices. Kitty can go to Charlie and ask him to divorce his wife to marry her or she can go with Walter into the middle of a cholera epidemic.
In the middle of this epidemic, Kitty finally starts to realize what a good man Walter is. She still does not love him but can see for the perhaps the first time how lucky she is to have someone like him. Kitty begins to view her self differently as well. But Walter, once so madly in love, can not forgive Kitty her sin.
With beautiful China as a backdrop to this story of growth, The Painted Veil is a classic. It is beautifully written, the writing compact but amazingly detailed. Kitty is finely drawn and fully realized, Walter much more distant but still captivating.
The ending, while being satisfying, is the not ending that I hoped for. Desperately I wanted Kitty to find something in Walter to love; I wanted to see their relationship healed. But in the end it is her relationship with her father that is mended and the narrowness of her soul expanded.
Article comments
1 - Natalie Bennett
This article has been selected for syndication to Advance.net, which is affiliated with newspapers around the United States. Nice work!
2 - Katie McNeill
Thank you Natalie! :)
3 - Nicole
Personally, I really couldn't find anything to like about Kitty, and I really didn't think she changed all that much by the end of the novel: yes, she did grow up a bit, but I still don't think she became a 'good' person. To be even more honest, I found that I despised her because she is the exact sort of person that I hate: shallow, stupid, commonplace, second-rate, not at all serious about anything, selfish, vain, and someone who takes advantage of others. While I do feel that she did start to recognize Walter's value, it really bothered me that even then she couldn't love someone who was such a wonderful man and such a kind human being; she was so unappreciative of true value and only appreciated the cheap and the vulgar. It seems like that still happens a lot today: people who are introverted and intelligent but shy, sensitive, and self-conscious are unappreciated despite their worth and yet people who are outgoing, shallow, charming, don't take anything seriously, and don't have a great deal of intelligence are the kind of people that are considered more desirable because they fit into society better, which I think is really sad. Also, it really bothered me that Kitty never took enough responsibility for her own actions and that she always found someone else to blame for the way that she was (e.g., her mother, or even Walter, when she blames him at the beginning of the book, saying it's his fault he didn't have the things to make her love him). Kitty had a horrible mother, but that doesn't give her an excuse for being so cruel to someone who cared so deeply for her: she had absolutely no excuse for the way she treated Walter. Wanting to get married before Doris and be socially acceptable is no excuse for breaking a man's heart; if she didn't love him, she should have just said no and either gone back to one of her old boyfriends or else suck up her pride and be happy for her sister's good fortune. It's not like there were no spinsters during that time: of course I understand that it wasn't as acceptable to be permanently single as it is today, but it's not as though NO ONE ever chose not to marry; it really bothered me that Kitty let what was "traditional" and "acceptable" and "respectable" be the deciding factor in her decisions and thus caused her to break someone else's heart in the process. I see Kitty as being a copy of her mother; the way that Kitty mistreats Walter is just like the way that Mrs. Garstin mistreats Kitty's father, which is kind of funny to me considering how much she dislikes her mother. Plus, they're both socially-minded and don't really care how they treat other people, which also bothered me.
And at the end, when Kitty still doesn't feel any emotion for Walter after everything that he goes through and instead feels relief and peace despite all of the trouble and suffering that she causes him...that was what really did it for me: if she had at least has some sort of warm feeling toward him maybe I would've at least ended up neutral toward her, but despite what she herself says about having changed, she still seems like a low-class spoiled brat to me (although I will concede that I appreciate the way she treats her father, the way she leaves things with Walter supercedes that for me).
I did love the book though---anything that brings out such strong emotions is, to me, a sign of a great work--and I actually went out and bought my own copy three days after I checked it out from the library; it was just that good.
4 - Katie McNeill
Kitty is a hard character to like, your right about that. But that was the point. Maugham based the characters on a couple he knew and he was pointing out some of the couple's worse attributes. In the end though Walter didn't like Kitty anymore than she liked him. It was very sad and bitter.
It is such a great novel, though. So well written and it really does pull all of your emotion out as a reader. I don't blame you for buying a copy. This is one I'll be keeping around.
5 - Caroline Wood
Well,I've just finished reading the book after seeing the movie a month ago. It was Edward Norton's seductive acting that drew me into the story and then the honesty of the humanity of the story held me. I read the book in two days. I would have tried for a one day read because I loved it that much. The atmosphere of the novel was intoxicating. Maugham is a favorite novelist of mine. Kitty's character is woven with the delicacy of spider's web. Although we were to view Walter only objectively, I felt I saw behind his veil and could see his goodness, which Kitty was able to see finally. I felt like she was on the verge of falling in love with him and yes, I very much wanted to because I had fallen in love with him. I think she did change completely at the end of the novel and I think she was able to see the gentle greatness in her father because she saw it in Walter. Though because Kitty's father wasn't an established character earlier in the story I found the story took a turn from the 'real' story when it ended with her patched relationship with her father. But then again if this is a story about Kitty, which it is, then this was her journey. It's just that Walter (Edward Norton) was so sensitive and sexual and smart and noble, you wanted Kitty to love him. Maybe I'm saying this because I want it this way, but I think Kitty did come to love Walter; love is not just one thing. And I believe when her daughter grew old enough to hear such stories Kitty told her all about her dear, dear father Walter.
I can see how Kitty was not her own person but her mother's daughter, but she did climb out of it. I thought it a little contrived that her mother died on Kitty's voyage back. But Maugham is a great story teller and you did feel like you were reading a great story. Thanks for posting your review Katie. I enjoyed Natalie's too, though I think I have more sympathy for Kitty, though only because she changed. If she hadn't changed I would have had no time for her.
6 - Brad83
Where does the title come from? "Veil" makes perfect sense as it refers to the aspects of any person that we do not and can not know. As shown in the movie, what is behind our "veils" is constantly changing. "Painted", however, connotes, to me, something that may appear to have movement or change but is, in fact, fixed and unchangeable. Any consensus in the scholarship or special thoughts of your own?
Thanks,
Brad83
7 - CarolLei
Brad, I was wondering the same thing about the title. I kept waiting for it to make sense but, to me, it never did.
I was a little surprised with the ending and her declarations about how she was going to raise her child, hopefully a girl. She wanted her child to be very different from herself, faults that she attributed to her upbringing. She seemed very critical of her own parents' parenting, and here she is, trying to make serious amends with her father.
8 - hassan
i didn't see the movie but i read the book 10 years ago. it's a book u want to read anytime u keep thinking about the complex nature of the human being. the plot is well constructed and the characters are in a certain point familiar to us. the end is not very surprising.Kitty has changed but not enough to please the reader.
9 - Xmagine
The title is a reference to the Shelley sonnet 'Lift not the painted veil which those who live.' The entirety of this sonnet is as follows:
Lift not the painted veil which those who live Call Life: though unreal shapes be pictures there, And it but mimic all we would believe With colours idly spread, -- behind, lurk Fear And Hope, twin Destinies; who ever weave Their shadows, o'er the chasm, sightless and drear. I knew one who had lifted it -- he sought, For his lost heart was tender, things to love, But found them not, alas! nor was there aught The world contains, the which he would approve. Through the unheeding many he did move, A splendour among shadows, a bright blot Upon this gloomy scene, a Spirit that strove For truth, and like the Preacher found it not.
10 - Shirley
I love how Ed Norton took the story a step further and developed Kitty and Walter's love in the movie. Like some of the other posters, I really disliked Kitty. I kept expecting her to fall in love with Walter, or at least develop a warmth and fondness for him. I think she came to respect him but never felt any warmth for him, despite her acknowledging he was handsome and a good man. I also thought it was selfish that as he lay dying, her main concern was her own absolution. I don't feel she grew enough as a human by the end of the book, and despised her when she let herself be seduced by Charlie that final time. But there was plenty else to enjoy in the book, and the film is simply beautiful.
11 - dearreader
Thank you, Xmagine, for the origin of the title. A careful reading shows that Kitty did not seek Walter's forgiveness for herself. She sought it for him. In His wisdom, God knows that when we forgive, we relieve ourselves of bitterness. Kitty finally understood that Walter would pass from the world easier if he had forgiven her. Walter also needed to forgive himself....I took his ironic last words to mean that he had not.
Great book and story.