The Painted Veil

"How can I be reasonable? To me our love was everything and you were my whole life. It is not very pleasant to realize that to you it was only an episode." -Kitty, The Painted Veil (1925) by Somerset Maugham The Painted Veil (1925) by Somerset Maugham is a romance set in England and Hong Kong. The title refers to the first line of a sonnet written by Percy Bysshe Shelley: "Lift not the painted veil which those who live / Call Life." The author delves deep into the psyche of a mismatched married couple, Kitty and Walter, dealing with affairs and adultery. After Kitty's affair is discovered, Walter gives her the ultimatum of accompanying him to cholera-stricken mainland China or enduring a publicly humiliating divorce. This is just a glimpse of a page-turning novel filled with human conflict that any reader will want to add to their personal library.
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