No novel better illustrates Maugham's lack of social concern than The Razor's Edge, a novel that sold more than two and a half million copies in America within a four-year period.

With a detached, urbane, cosmopolitan narrator, the plot ranges over more than a decade, with action occurring in at least three countries. The narrator's chief interest is in seeing what sense a varied set of characters can make of their lives, and in the end their lives do conform to a kind of pattern. While they are affected by events like the Great Depression, these remain subordinate to the narrator's emphasis upon character.