The Moon and Sixpence is a novel by modern British writer Maugham published in 1919.
The novel is based on the life of the French Impressionist painter Paul Gauguin. The protagonist, Strickland, was originally a london securities broker, and one day suddenly threw off his wife and children, left the family that was regarded as happy, and ran to Paris.
In fact, he came here to study painting. His life was extremely hard, and he sometimes made a living by borrowing, but he continued to work hard and uninterrupted.
There was a painter with mediocre but high appreciation for him, Stroeve, who admired him, often helped him, and took him to his home for convalescence when he was sick.
Stroeve's wife fell in love with him while caring for Strickland and wanted to live with him. Strickland eventually settled on the island of Tahiti in the South Pacific. And married. Here his artistic genius was brought into play, painting many works that shocked the art world. He ended up dying in his bedroom with a huge mural.
The works express the contradictions between genius, individuality and material civilization, as well as modern marriage and family life, and reflect the shackles and strangulation of artists' personality and creation by Western civilization.
The novel is simple in writing, clear in context, clear in character, ups and downs in plot, and has a considerable number of readers at all levels, making it one of the most popular novels in the West.
Gauguin was on a par with Van Gogh and was a painter of the age of the world. The novel was popular around the world as soon as it was published, distributed in 110 countries in 62 languages, sold 60 million copies, and was twice adapted into a movie.
"The Moon and sixpence" has become a classic masterpiece across the ages in the quicksand of time, so that later, people often compare the moon to ideals, poems and distant places, and regard sixpence as the helplessness of the present and reality.
The moon is the literature of the heart, and the sixpence is the chicken and dog fragment of life. However, higher-order literature and art should be to have dreams in the world of rolling red dust, and to work hard to practice in the steaming fireworks of the world to achieve what is desired in the heart.
Complaining that Huai Cai did not meet, accusing reality of ruthlessness, pretentious but choosing to escape, is the work of pseudo-Wenqing whose ability is not worthy of desire. Truly powerful literary and artistic youth can take care of their own lives, but also have the ability to protect their inner dreams, prepare for the trough, and have the ability to seize the opportunity when it comes, and realize the ideal in their hearts.