# LV explained — Of Human Bondage

> Chapter companion for Of Human Bondage by W. Somerset Maugham.

## What happens

Philip returns to medical school but finds the work tedious and struggles to fit in. He makes a casual friend in Dunsford, who becomes infatuated with a waitress named Mildred. Philip, initially indifferent, is stung by her rudeness and becomes obsessed with getting even with her.

## Themes in this chapter

### Isolation and Belonging

Philip feels disconnected from his fellow medical students and struggles to form meaningful relationships, echoing his earlier school experiences.

### Love and Obsession

Philip's wounded pride leads to an obsessive preoccupation with Mildred, foreshadowing his later destructive infatuation.

## Character check-ins

### Philip Carey

Struggles with the tedium of medical studies and feels isolated; becomes fixated on Mildred after she snubs him.

### Dunsford

Philip's new friend, a good-humored but simple medical student who admires the waitress Mildred.

### Mildred Rogers

A waitress at a tea shop; cold and insolent toward Philip, which piques his pride and leads to an obsession.

### Griffiths

A fifth-year medical student living above Philip; popular and sociable, contrasting with Philip's isolation.

## Key lines

> He felt sick at heart. He found that it was easy to make a heroic gesture, but hard to abide by its results.

Philip felt deeply unhappy, realizing that grand decisions are simple to make but difficult to live with.

_Reflects Philip's disillusionment after abandoning art for medicine._

> He desired popularity but could bring himself to make no advances to others. A fear of rebuff prevented him from affability, and he concealed his shyness, which was still intense, under a frigid taciturnity.

Philip longed to be liked but was too afraid of rejection to be friendly, hiding his shyness behind a cold, silent demeanor.

_Highlights Philip's social anxiety and isolation._

> She had the small regular features, the blue eyes, and the broad low brow, which the Victorian painters, Lord Leighton, Alma Tadema, and a hundred others, induced the world they lived in to accept as a type of Greek beauty.

Her appearance matched the conventional Victorian ideal of Greek beauty, popularized by painters like Leighton and Alma Tadema.

_Describes Mildred's looks through the lens of contemporary art standards._

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/of_human_bondage_se/chapters/lv
- Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/of_human_bondage_se
- All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/of_human_bondage_se/chapters