Items

• Enemy : a novel
  First published in the UK in 1981 as ‘The Deserters’, ‘Enemy’ was based initially on Robin Maugham’s play of the same name, which premiered in Guildford in 1969 before transferring to London. Maugham (1916-1981), the nephew of the novelist W. Somerset Maugham, drew on his experience in the Sahara during the Second World War for this tale of two soldiers, one British and one German, who stumble across each other in the desert. Maugham depicts a friendship that crosses boundaries of class, sexuality and nationality. Supported by Peter Burton, who edited Maugham’s short-story collection ‘The Boy from Beirut’, another of the books seized in ‘Operation Tiger’, ‘Enemy’ was the last book Maugham published before he died.
• The boy from Beirut : and other stories
  Robin Maugham (1916-1981), Second Viscount Maugham of Hartfield and nephew of the novelist W. Somerset Maugham, wrote short stories, novels, screenplays, plays and non-fiction. “Bisexual, though predominantly homosexual”, as he put it, Maugham published his first short story in 1943 (‘The 1946 Ms’, praised by George Orwell), turning more to gay themes in his post-1970 work. Published posthumously, Maugham’s ‘The Boy from Beirut’ consists of eight short stories, introduced by writer and former editor for ‘Gay News’, Peter Burton. These stories draw partly on Maugham’s time in North Africa during the Second World War and had all previously been published in the UK. The volume closes with Burton’s long interview with Maugham, first published in ‘Gay Sunshine’ magazine in the Summer/Fall edition, 1977 (no. 33/34).