The Moon & Sixpence
Format: hardcover
ISBN:
9781582870502 (1582870500)
Publisher: North Books
Edition language: English
Category:
Classics,
Novels,
Literature,
European Literature,
British Literature,
Book Club,
Historical Fiction,
Classic Literature,
Literary Fiction,
Art,
English Literature
This book did not age well. The rampant racism and sexism that are a sign of the times Maugham lived in make this Künstlerroman unbearable in several places. Plus for a fairly short book, there's a surprising amount of filler.
Moon and Sixpence is a beautifully written novel about a very ugly person. I do not mean physically, but rather spiritually. The novel is loosely based on the life of the artist Paul Gaugin. The setting is a combination of London, Paris and Tahiti during the late 1800s and is told through the thi...
Other thoughts/reviews:Col Reads: http://colreads.blogspot.be/2012/07/book-review-moon-and-sixpence-by-w.html
I picked up 'The Moon and Sixpence' a few years ago at a library book sale thinking, purely from the cover image and my limited knowledge of when Maugham wrote, that it was a novel about the Pacific in World War II. It turns out I was way off. Which is fine by me since I wasn't eager to read a novel...
What it takes to be a real artist is debatable. A sudden urge to create, an invincible desire to stay away from anything that’s mundane (that includes your current job) and keeps you away from your true calling – I can take that. But leaving everything behind, i.e. spouse and children, and completel...