In 1921, a boat carrying Somerset Maugham upriver in Borneo capsized in eight-foot waves, and for half an hour the writer clung desperately to the wreckage. 'At last, helped by some of the crew,' a district officer reported, 'Maugham managed to reach the bank utterly exhausted. Dyaks took the shipwrecked party into their house, revived them with drink and provided them with sarongs.' The officer seized his moment and suggested that Maugham script a film about James Brooke, the first White Rajah of Sarawak. 'He said no; there was no love interest in the first Rajah's life.'

LRB 12 December 2002 | PDF Download