The Points Of Maugham' S Novel Criticism

William Somerset Maugham is one of the famous British novelists and playwrights in the twentieth Century.In the 70 years of Writing,he left about twenty novels,thirty-two plays,more than and 120 short stories and a large number of literature reviews,essays,travel notes and memoirs,in which the novels were treated as the highest achievements in his career.As an experienced novelist,Maugham formed his own unique views of art criticism during his long writing process.Maugham is the author of the Literary Essays(including "Ten Best Sellers","Points of View","The vagrant mood"),and two autobiographical essays("A Writer's Notebook","the Summing Up")are also involved in his literary creations and the literary criticism thoughts specifically.The formation of these novels not only depends on Maugham' s theory of literary criticism,but also depends on his own creative practice of writing.Based on Maugham' s works,this paper tries to sort out his criticism of the novel,and discusses the criticism of the novel by Maugham.The second part mainly discusses Maugham 's experience from writing to internal criticism.As an occupation writer,Maugham understands the art of fiction.When refers to the text and internal factors,on the one hand,Maugham can quote the classics,at the same time even discussed the views of the writers a couple of centuries ago.On the other hand,based on his own experience of writing,with a unique perspective and ways different from the ordinary text internal criticism,his criticism involved in the language and style of the novel,the novel nature and specific skills and so on..In this part,I will use the theory of textual criticism to summarize the internal standard of Maugham' s novels.The third part is from personal experience to writer's biography criticism.In “The vagrant mood","Ten Best Sellers" and other literary criticism,Maugham' s comments on many writers and works has always maintained a principle,that is,what kind of writer will write what kind of work.Maugham is very concerned about the writer's life experience,which is called writer's biography criticism.In this part,through the analysis of Maugham' s criticism of different writers' biography,the author reviews the evaluation criteria of Maugham 's novels from the different elements of biographical criticism.The fourth part discusses the aesthetic pursuit to reader-response criticism.Maugham does not agree with the point that him is a "popular writer" who caters to readers' expectations.in fact,he has always attached the importance to the reader's response.Maugham consciously stand in the perspective of fiction novelist to consider the importance of the readers and literary critic.All of which reflects his faithful to the novel aesthetic appeal.The aesthetic consciousness of the art and the pursuit of tastes in literary,absorbing the beneficial factors to the development of literature in the era of Maugham,a keen grasp of public taste,rich tradition of realism,to create a lasting vitality of works of art.In this part,I will use the theory of reader criticism to clarify Maugham' s aesthetic pursuit and the relationship between Maugham 's literary including the elements such as writers,works,readers and critics.The fifth part summarizes the value and significance of Maugham' s literary criticism.It is precisely because of Maugham' s practical basis of literary criticism,the theory of experience and the writing practice,which determines that the literary criticism of Maugham' s will not be able to use only one special way of criticism.Maugham treated the art practice itself as a review of the literature criticism,with the evaluation of the text criticism,Biographical Criticism and reader--response criticism an so on.All of this are different from the use of a special kind of literary criticism theory to evaluate literary works.This kind of novel criticism is more comprehensive and reasonable.There exists a great difference between the study of Maugham' s criticism of novels and the study of his specific works.Especially the study at home.In addition to academic circles' big difference on the "Maugham problem",which related to an important factor : translation works can not be overlooked in time.In addition,Maugham is a very broad range writer,his novels,short stories,plays and travel novels are not only various,but also remarkable achievements.The critics scattered in the prose literary essays focuses less on novels,the related studies is lack even missing,which provides a new idea for this study.This article based on the Maugham 's novel practice and by using the text analysis,combining text criticism,Biographical Criticism Theory,reader response criticism theory and creative practice of Maugham himself,to make a more comprehensive understanding of Maugham' s view,and to make more rational judgment on Maugham' s works.In addition to providing more reasonable view to the study Maugham' s novels and the research of Maugham' s literary criticism,the basic theory and practical experience and the diversification of literary criticism of Maugham himself which can approach to a more comprehensive and more close to reality as possible.