 David Haberman has pointed out that Ronald Nixon, an Englishman who took monastic vows and became known as Krishna Prem, served as a fighter pilot in the First World War and experienced a crisis of meaninglessness that was "strikingly similar" to that experienced by Larry.Another distinct possibility for influence is raised by the anglicised American, British MP Chips Channon in his diaries.During a trip to New York in August 1944, Channon wrote ″I saw much of Somerset Maugham, who never before was a friend.