Books: Old Man with a Razor

THE RAZOR'S EDGE — W. Somerset Maugham—Doubleday, Doran ($2.75).

Somerset Maugham, always a discreet man, has been so imprudent as to live to a ripe age (70) when novelists are usually far past their prime. But, unlike some of his other books, The Razor's Edge is not a potboiler. Nor is it a mess of dotage. It deserves to rank after Of Human Bondage (1915) and The Moon and Sixpence (1919) as one of his three major novels.

Confessional. Maugham disarmingly calls attention to the fact that he is making his first attempt...