Book Review

The novel The Moon and Sixpence is written by William Somerset Maugham and published in 1919. It describes a story about the central character, Charles Strickland’s life experience. He is a London stockbroker. But he renounces his wife, children and business in order to paint. After going through a variety of bizarre experiences, he got to Tahiti and married with a local girl. He created a lot of great artistic works there but end up dying sadly. In Paris, Strickland woos and wins a friend’s wife away just so that he can paint her; when she kills herself, he is seemingly unaffected but leaves Paris. The story is partly based on the life of painter Paul Gauguin.

The author shaped a bright character by all the strange things about Strickland. As it uses the painter Paul Gauguin’s life as materials, it shows the contradictory between great intelligence, personality, material and modern marriage, family life. This production has a wild sight of life and dissects the humanity under skin sharply.

What I think about most is that what we can do about the marvelous personality and the unfitted reality. I think no one should obey his or her original conscience. But it does not fully depend on ourselves. We all have to face to the cruel reality. And nobody is isolated. We can’t just be what we want to be. It is connected to many things around us. But once we choose to give up these to become ourselves, it will become both great and miserable. Like Strickland gives up all the things he used to own and chooses his own way. He completes a lot of works, but still can’t get out. More truly, the painter Paul Gauguin’s life experience is right in front of us. Back to the title, the moon is a high, virtual thing. It represents the ideal. While pence is the smallest current unit, which means reality. How to choose between the moon and sixpence? It is the eternal theme in humans.

2020-07-03

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