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The Magician (1908) - W. Somerset Maugham

Pizzabeak

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Pretty good novel about bourgeoisie folk lunching. The villain is Oliver Haddo, who is a caricature of Aleister Crowley. The main character, Arthur, kills him at the end by choking him (since he kidnapped his bride-to-be, fiancé, and tried to seduce her). In his lab, they found homunculi in jars, as he was trying to create men.

Haddo comes off as extremely unlikable, and is described as a "fat, hulking embodiment of a person". He just shows up one day and tries to impress the group with tricks. He ends up provoking Arthur into assaulting him, probably on purpose, just to manipulate that whole situation and plot for whatever reason.

I have been considering myself a freethinker for a long time so thought this would have been good to read for any extra context I didn't have. The ending was kind of fast and may leave you wanting to research other similar topics to further your overall understanding. Despite that, it didn't change a thing about how I felt about it.

I thought it was good and recommend to people here who enjoy novels, and no, it has nothing to do with that show titled "The Magicians".
 
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