内容简介
一个生活安定的英国证券交易所经纪人，本已有牢靠的职业和地位、美满的家庭，人届中年却突然抛妻弃子，为响应内心的呼唤，到巴黎去追求绘画的理想。在异国他乡，他贫病交加，对梦想却愈发坚定执着。经过一番离奇的遭遇后，他离开文明世界，远遁到与世隔绝的一座南太平洋岛上，找到了灵魂的宁静和适合自己艺术气质的氛围，全身心投入绘画，并在死后声名大噪。
在这部小说里，借“我”之口叙述了整个故事，有人认为这篇小说取材自法国后印象派画家高更的生平，更增加了这部小说的传奇色彩，受到了全世界读者的关注。
作者简介
威廉·萨默塞特·毛姆（1874—1965），英国著名小说家，剧作家，散文家。1892至1897年在伦敦学医，并取得外科医师资格。1897年开始创作，1915年发表长篇小说《人间的枷锁》，1919年《月亮与六便士》出版，引起巨大反响，奠定了了他作为世界一流小说家的地位。代表作有戏剧《圈子》，长篇小说《人生的枷锁》《月亮和六便士》，短篇小说集《叶的震颤》《阿金》等。毛姆被公认为20世纪在全世界范围内流行很广、很受欢迎的英国作家之一。他的小说机智、幽默，常在讥讽中潜藏对人性的怜悯与同情。1952年，牛津大学授予他名誉博士学位。1954年，英王授予他“荣誉侍从”的称号。
First published in 1919, W. Somerset Maugham’s “The Moon and Sixpence” is an episodic first person narrative based on the life of Paul Gaugin. At the center of the novel is the story of Charles Strickland, an English banker who walks away from a life of privilege, abruptly abandoning his wife and children, in order to pursue his passion to become an artist. Strickland leaves London for Paris and ultimately Tahiti, mirroring the life of Gaugin who would also split with his wife to pursue a life of painting eventually immigrating to Tahiti. The title of the novel, which is never clearly explained in the novel, comes from a review for Maugham’s previous work “Of Human Bondage” in which that novel’s protagonist, Philip Carey, is described as “so busy yearning for the moon that he never saw the sixpence at his feet.” The moon in this sense might be seen as the lofty ambition to pursue a life of artistic expression in contrast to the sixpence which represents the security of a middle-class life style with wife and children to which the protagonist abandons. “The Moon and Sixpence” is the story of the demands that can be placed on a tortured artistic soul and consequently the lives that it touches. This edition is printed on premium acid-free paper.
