This is an Intermediate Level title in a series of ELT readers comprising a wide range of stories - some original and some simplified - from modern and classic novels, and designed to appeal to all age-groups, tastes and cultures. The books are divided into five levels: Starter Level, with about 300 basic words; Beginner Level (600 basic words); Elementary Level (1100); Intermediate Level (1600); and Upper Level (2200). Some of the titles are also available on cassette.

The Circle is set in the fashionable drawing room of Aston-Adey, the Champion-Cheneys' house in Dorset. Maugham's plot, which may be unfamiliar, contains two triangles, each of a husband, wife, and lover. The first of these includes Clive, a cuckolded husband, Lady Kitty, his ex-wife, and Lord Porteous, her second husband. Thirty years before the start of the play, Lady Kitty ran off to Italy with Lord Porteous, leaving her husband and five-year-old son Arnold to their own devices. The play opens with the return of this now aged couple to England and a family reunion negotiated by Arnold's curious wife. To complicate matters, the earlier abandoned husband Clive intrudes upon the visiting couple, losing no chance to wreak hilarious verbal havoc. The second triangle, one of young people, consists of the stuffy MP and furniture collector Arnold, his lively but bored wife, and their pleasing house guest Teddie. Bringing matters full circle, Elizabeth and Teddie have fallen for each other. The central concern of the play thus becomes whether they will bolt like the lovers of thirty years ago. Maugham's hall of mirrors action wittily calls to mind the famous question: Do people learn anything from the past, or is the only lesson the past has to offer that people have never learned anything from it?

WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY PAUL THEROUX Somerset Maugham's success as a writer enabled him to indulge his adventurous love of travel, and he recorded the sights and sounds of his wide-ranging journeys with an urbane, wry style all his own. The Gentleman in the Parlour is an account of the author's trip through what was then Burma and Siam, ending in Haiphong, Vietnam. Whether by river to Mandalay, on horse through the mountains and forests of the Shan States to Bangkok, or onwards by sea, Maugham's vivid descriptions bring a lost world to life.

The second of four volumes of short stories which reflect Somerset Maugham's wry perception of human foibles and gift for evoking drama from a sense of time and place. Set in Malaya, America and England, they include "Flotsam and Jetsam," "The Man With the Sca,r" and "The Vessel of Wrath." For more than seventy years, Penguin has been the leading publisher of classic literature in the English-speaking world. With more than 1,700 titles, Penguin Classics represents a global bookshelf of the best works throughout history and across genres and disciplines. Readers trust the series to provide authoritative texts enhanced by introductions and notes by distinguished scholars and contemporary authors, as well as up-to-date translations by award-winning translators.

The Casuarina Tree is a collection of short stories set in the Federated Malay States during the 1920s by W. Somerset Maugham. The stories are loosely based on Maugham's experiences traveling in the region for about a year. The strong thread running through the stories is alienation and contrast - between people and cultures. For most of the characters, after a crisis in their circumstances, life seems to take up where it left off and closes over the revelations that brought on the drama. Maugham was considered persona non grata among the expatriate British community in the Federated Malay States following the publication of The Casuarina Tree as he was felt to have betrayed confidences and to have painted the community in an unflattering light through his focus on scandal. The major themes are class division, racial difference, adultery, personal competitiveness, and human nature in reaction to fate. Contents: - Before the Party - P. & O. - The Outstation - The Force of Circumstance - The Yellow Streak - The Letter