An essay on the story The Bum

by W. Somerset Maugham

Сочинение

I) We have read "The Bum" written by W. Somerset Maugham, who is one of the most popular and widely read English writers. He wrote novels, short stories and plays, and most of them had a great commercial success.

What brought success to his short stories was an economical, exact and expressive style and a mastery of constructing a story. The author knew how to keep his reader in suspense.

"The Bum" is a sort of a biographical story though the most significant part of it left untold and wrapped up in mystery. It is about a meeting with a bum , a beggar, a person, who is a complete wreck, and, at the same time, it is a meeting with a tragedy, which is in the background and which makes the story unique and poetic.

I suppose that the theme of "The Bum" is the arrogance of youth. I think that W. Somerset Maugham wanted to show how destructive and silly it can be. The writer showed us a person, whose unhappy life was an example of the disastrous effect of arrogance. In his green years this person wanted to become a brilliant writer, he thought that he was a genius, but, to my mind, he was just haughty. I suppose that he had no talent to become a good writer. He had no friends because of his arrogance, so he was lonely. And I think that he suffered very much, but he did not want to change his attitude to other people.

“He was not popular among us because he was arrogant, and we were none of us old enough to take the arrogance of youth with tolerance.”

He eluded people, and despised their attitude to him.  “He would not show us his work because our praise meant nothing to him and he despised our censure. His vanity was enormous.”

So his purpose to become a writer could not be realised. I suppose that the inability to achieve his purpose in life crippled the person’s mind, and he became a bum. To my mind, the description of the beggars evokes sorrow, pity and shame. We must be sorry for them because their lives are unhappy, and many of them live in difficult conditions, and, to my mind, we can blame ourselves for the beggars’ suffering. I think that it’s everyone’s fault. (Sometimes one can't change circumstances of one's life).

I want to mention one very interesting detail used by W.Somerset Maugham. The writer described the church. Maybe, W. Somerset Maugham wanted to underline that people are equal for God, but they are not equal in life.

The narrator, who is the main hero of the story, was not even surprised to meet so many beggars in Vera Cruz, it showed that beggars were a usual event for him, and they evoked anger in him. Maybe, he was right because “they gave one no place,” but, to my mind, beggars are different. Some of them do not even try to begin to earn money. Such persons do not deserve any sympathy with them. But some people have no opportunity to earn money, maybe, the circumstances of their lives prevent them to be happy, and, to my mind, one must not be indifferent wards to them, one ought to try to help them.

I think that the plot of the "The Bum" is quite probable, as W. Somerset Maugham emphasized real aspects of life. I think that the problem of poverty is actual nowdays, so "The Bum" seems convincing, and its background seems authentic.

I suppose that the characters of "The Bum" are flesh and blood as we can meet such people in real life. That is why I think that they are true to life. The language of "The Bum" is easy, so the story reads well.

I believe that the message of "The Bum" can be expressed by the statement “Grand gestures are absurd.” The red-haired man has not changed, and his silly and absurd gesture showed it. W. Somerset Maugham wrote, “I took a yellow-backed note out of my pocket and pressed it in his hand. He did not give it a glance. But his hand moved a little, the thin claw-like fingers closed on the note and scrunched it up; he made it into a little ball and then, edging it to his thumb, flicked it into the air so that it fell among the jangling buzzards.” It showed that the red-haired man remained the same arrogant person, as he was 20 years before. Nothing could change him. But his gesture was silly and absurd because the narrator of the story wanted to help him. I think that the red-haired man felt sure that he was independent like buzzards, when he flicked the note into the air, but, to my mind, he was feckless like buzzards. I think that the red-haired man is a complete wreck, he is a wreck of humanity.

In conclusion, I want to add that, to my mind, "The Bum" is an instructive story as it helped us to understand that we must not be arrogant in our life.

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THE END

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to irritate smb; one aspires to survive.

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Yekaterina Odintsova, 2017