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月亮和六便士 The Moon and Sixpence
如果你看了原文,就可以看出作者的思路,月亮是美好,純潔的代名詞,便士是金錢社會的代名詞.主人公原來是一個富有的上層人士,在經歷了空虛的前半生後,他開始了真正的理想追求,他的一生都在追求純粹的美,震撼的美.而用月亮來詮釋他的追求是最合適的.對一般人來說,月亮高不可求,但這正好反映了主人公執著的追求和高潔的人格.相比周圍的配角,他們沒有也不想脫離現實的欲望,因此用便士來形容他們所在的世界是在合適不過了，至於作者用六這個數字,實際上沒有什麽特別的意義,毛姆的很多作品裏都有一些隨意的東西(也可以說是創意或者個性標榜),我們不用在這個數字上透析.
我記得讀這本小說已經很久了。記憶不在清晰，蒙朧的回憶是中痛苦的殘記。但我仍要推薦這本小說。我的眼光一直是另類的眼光，但我對文本的讀法也許本身就有屬於我的記憶。我不想說是我誤讀了毛姆。因為作品一旦被創造出就不屬於作者自己，也許作品有時候衹屬於作者自己！外來的讀法是種主觀的想法。
我記得錢鐘書先生决定寫《圍城》時就是因為受到毛姆的刺激。錢先生的學問是沒有人與之可以媲美的。別的不再多說。話說多了會惹出麻煩的。錢鐘書先生說：毛姆都能寫出那樣的小說。讀者直多是無法計算的。毛姆當時確實是炙手可熱的人物。於是乎《圍城》橫空出世！關於《圍城》它可以說是藉着錢先生的才華融多傢與一體的傑作。其中可以看出很多歐美小說名傢的影子，以為錢先生學貫中西的才華《圍城》被寫成了一部傑作！
閑話說的已經多了，下面我談談自己對《月亮和六便士》的看法：毛姆以前是個醫生，而當醫生的這段經歷為他日後的創作提供了大量的材料。但《月亮和六便士》的原型是法國印象派畫傢高更。
高更的畫本身就很有價值，這部以他為原形的小說風靡後，高更的繪畫藝術和作品受到了更大的關註，高更印象派宗師的地位得到確立。同時，塔希提島-----高更隱居的小島也名揚與世，成了旅遊勝地。
根據高更的著作《馬裏歐的古代信仰》,知道女人是月神希納,男人是地神法脫。大地之神主宰人世的生成和輪轉,乃是必然的毀滅。月之女神長官永遠的豐收和不朽。
這個關於這個作品的題外話，而真正的文學內涵遠非如此簡單的解讀。我自己的看法是：這個本小說遠遠超過毛姆自己的解讀。因為我發現其實這本小說寫的是關於天才的事情！天才是個殘酷的字眼，人們根本不願意承認天才！因為我們總相信：天才出於勤奮！事實上並非如此。尤其在文學領域。真正的優秀的藝術傢是天才。文學不過是藝術中最上乘的精品！我知道的這個就是我讀《月亮和六便士》的感悟！我作下我殘酷的决定放棄化學從而轉嚮文學就是因為這個緣故。我也許更適合搞文學。
我感激我在大一那次靈魂的顫慄！《月亮和六便士》主人公思特裏剋蘭德那“曠野的呼喊”終於讓我認識到了自我。
作傢就是這樣的一種人，他們把人類的智慧發現後用作品表現出來。我自己是學習化學的。我自己很難均衡文科與理科的思維。理科講的是科學。科學真的是個很麻煩的詞語。嚴格意義上說衹有能用數學公式表達的東西纔是科學。科學越來越教我懷疑？懷疑所謂的科學？所謂的科學根本解决不了人類的問題！我不想藉文學來闡釋科學。我多言了。
房子裏的光綫特別暗，仿佛是，他突然走入了一個神的世界；蒙蒙朧朧中，他好象覺得自己正置於一個原始森林中，大樹下倘徉着一些赤身裸體的人。特拉斯醫生幾乎連呼吸都停止了，過了一會兒他纔知道，他看到的是四壁上巨大的壁畫。他心中出現了一種既無法理解又不能分析的感情。這幅畫具有壓人的氣勢，它既是肉欲的，又充滿無限熱情，與此同時又含着某種恐懼成分......繪製這幅巨作的人已經深入到大自然的隱秘中，知道了一般人所不知道的事物。他畫的是某種原始的令人震懾的東西，既美的驚人，又污穢邪惡，他的畫奇異而荒誕，好像宇宙初創時的圖景----伊甸園，亞當和夏娃……
“上帝啊，這是天才” 特拉斯醫生掩口驚呼。
這個原文的話，感謝作者道出了真理的話，藝術是屬於天才的！這個是震撼靈魂的話語！
有兩本相似的小說《月亮和六便士》和塞林格的《麥田的守望者》。這兩個小說的主人公有着驚人的相似。
《月亮和六便士》不乏精彩的句子。如：
“世界是冷酷無情的、殘酷的。我們生到人世間沒有人知道為了什麽，我們死後沒有人知道到何處去。我們必須自甘卑屈。我們必須看到冷清寂寥的美妙。在生活中我們一定不要出風頭、露頭角，惹起命運對我們註目。讓我們去尋求那些淳樸、敦厚的人的愛情吧。他們的愚昧遠比我們的知識更為可貴。讓我們保持着沉默，滿足於自己小小的天地，像他們一樣平易溫順吧。這就是生活的智慧。”
“在愛這種感情中主要成分是溫柔。愛情中需要有一種軟弱無力的感覺，要有體貼愛護的要求，有幫助別人、取悅別人的熱情——如果不是無私，起碼是巧妙地遮掩起來的自私；愛情包含着某種程度的靦腆怯懦。……愛情要占據一個人莫大的精力，它要一個人離開自己的生活專門去做一個愛人。即使頭腦最清晰的人，從道理上他可能知道，在實際中卻不會承認愛情有一天會走到盡頭。愛情賦予他明知是虛幻的事物以實質形體，他明知道這一切不過是鏡花水月，愛它卻遠遠超過喜愛真實。它使一個人比原來的自我更豐富了一些，同時又使他比原來的自我更狹小了一些。他不再是一個人，他成了追求某一個他不瞭解的目的的一件事物、一個工具。……”
“我們每個人生在世界上都是孤獨的。每個人都被囚禁在一座鐵塔裏，衹能靠一些符號同別人傳達自己的思想；而這些符號並沒有共同的價值，因此它們的意義是模糊的、不確定的。我們非常可憐地想把自己心中的財富傳送給別人，但是他們卻沒有接受這些財富的能力。因此我們衹能孤獨地行走，儘管身體互相依傍卻並不在一起，既不瞭解別的人也不能為別人所瞭解。我們好像住在異國的人，對於這個國傢的語言懂得非常少，雖然我們有各種美妙的、深奧的事情要說，卻衹能局限於會話手册上那幾句陳腐、平庸的話。我們的腦子裏充滿了各種思想，而我們能說得衹不過是像‘園丁的姑母有一把傘在屋子裏’這類話。”
張賢亮在〈緑化樹〉中說：“凡是出現兩次的事物必有某種意義，那就是命運！”
文學，文學真的是很難言的東西，它如此另人費解，它不是靠智力，不是靠理性可以把握的。科學最大的弊端是可以模仿。即使你很笨，你仍然可以在科學上做出成績，尤其是化學！而文學則不然！這個也許就是文學的魅力！它如此令我癡迷！尼采說：“模仿無疑於自殺”。科學的本質正是模仿。
Plot summary
The novel is written largely from the point of view of the narrator, who is first introduced to the character of Strickland through his (Strickland's) wife and strikes him (the narrator) as unremarkable. Certain chapters are entirely composed of the stories or narrations of others which the narrator himself is recalling from memory (selectively editing or elaborating on certain aspects of dialogue, particularly Strickland's, as Strickland is said by the narrator to be limited in his use of verbiage and tended to use gestures in his expression).
Strickland, a well-off, middle-class stock broker in London some time in the late 19th or the first half of the 20th century. Early in the novel, he leaves his wife and children and goes to Paris, living a destitute but defiantly content life there as an artist (specifically a painter), lodging in run-down hotels and falling prey to both illness and hunger. Strickland, in his drive to express through his art what appears to continually possess and compel him inside, cares nothing for physical comfort and is generally ignorant to his surroundings, but is generously supported while in Paris by a commercially successful yet unexceptional Dutch painter, Dirk Stroeve, a friend of the narrator's, who immediately recognizes Strickland's genius. After helping Strickland recover from a life-threatening condition, Stroeve is repaid by having his wife, Blanche, abandon him for Strickland. Strickland later discards the wife (all he really sought from Blanche was a model to paint, not serious companionship, and it is hinted in the novel's dialogue that he indicated this to her and she took the risk anyway), who then commits suicide - yet another human casualty (the first ones being his own established life and those of his wife and children) in Strickland's single-minded pursuit of Art and Beauty.
After the Paris episode, the story continues in Tahiti. Strickland has already died, and the narrator attempts to piece together his life there from the recollections of others. He finds that Strickland had taken up with a native woman, had at least one child by her (only a son is directly referenced) and started painting profusely. We learn that Strickland had settled for a short while in the French port of Marseilles before traveling to Tahiti, where he lived for a few years before finally dying of leprosy. Strickland left behind numerous paintings, but his magnum opus, which he painted on the walls of his hut in a half-crazed state of leprosy-induced blindness, was burnt down after his death by his wife by his dying orders.
Inspiration
The inspiration for this story, Gauguin, is considered to be the founder of primitivism in art. The main differences between Gauguin and Strickland are that Gauguin was French rather than English, and whilst Maugham describes the character of Strickland as being largely ignorant of his contemporaries in Modern art (as well as largely ignorant of other artists in general), Gauguin himself was well acquainted with Van Gogh. How many of the details of the story are based on fact is not known. However, Maugham had visited the place where Gauguin lived in Tahiti, and purchased some glass panels painted by Gauguin in his final days.
About the title
According to some sources, the title, the meaning of which is not explicitly revealed in the book, was taken from a review of Of Human Bondage in which the novel's protagonist, Philip Carey, is described as "so busy yearning for the moon that he never saw the sixpence at his feet." Presumably Strickland's "moon" is the idealistic realm of Art and Beauty, while the "sixpence" represents human relationships and the ordinary pleasures of life.
Adaptations
The book was filmed by Albert Lewin in 1943. The film stars George Sanders as Charles Strickland.
The novel served as the basis for an opera, also titled The Moon and Sixpence, by John Gardner to a libretto by Patrick Terry; it was premiered at Covent Garden in 1958.
Writer S Lee Pogostin adapted it for American TV in 1959. It starred Laurence Olivier
In popular culture
In the opening scene of Francois Truffaut's cinematic adaptation of Fahrenheit 451, several firemen are preparing books for burning. In the crowd of onlookers is a little boy who picks up one of the books and thumbs through it before his father takes it from him and throws it on the pile with the rest. That book is The Moon and Sixpence.
我記得讀這本小說已經很久了。記憶不在清晰，蒙朧的回憶是中痛苦的殘記。但我仍要推薦這本小說。我的眼光一直是另類的眼光，但我對文本的讀法也許本身就有屬於我的記憶。我不想說是我誤讀了毛姆。因為作品一旦被創造出就不屬於作者自己，也許作品有時候衹屬於作者自己！外來的讀法是種主觀的想法。
我記得錢鐘書先生决定寫《圍城》時就是因為受到毛姆的刺激。錢先生的學問是沒有人與之可以媲美的。別的不再多說。話說多了會惹出麻煩的。錢鐘書先生說：毛姆都能寫出那樣的小說。讀者直多是無法計算的。毛姆當時確實是炙手可熱的人物。於是乎《圍城》橫空出世！關於《圍城》它可以說是藉着錢先生的才華融多傢與一體的傑作。其中可以看出很多歐美小說名傢的影子，以為錢先生學貫中西的才華《圍城》被寫成了一部傑作！
閑話說的已經多了，下面我談談自己對《月亮和六便士》的看法：毛姆以前是個醫生，而當醫生的這段經歷為他日後的創作提供了大量的材料。但《月亮和六便士》的原型是法國印象派畫傢高更。
高更的畫本身就很有價值，這部以他為原形的小說風靡後，高更的繪畫藝術和作品受到了更大的關註，高更印象派宗師的地位得到確立。同時，塔希提島-----高更隱居的小島也名揚與世，成了旅遊勝地。
根據高更的著作《馬裏歐的古代信仰》,知道女人是月神希納,男人是地神法脫。大地之神主宰人世的生成和輪轉,乃是必然的毀滅。月之女神長官永遠的豐收和不朽。
這個關於這個作品的題外話，而真正的文學內涵遠非如此簡單的解讀。我自己的看法是：這個本小說遠遠超過毛姆自己的解讀。因為我發現其實這本小說寫的是關於天才的事情！天才是個殘酷的字眼，人們根本不願意承認天才！因為我們總相信：天才出於勤奮！事實上並非如此。尤其在文學領域。真正的優秀的藝術傢是天才。文學不過是藝術中最上乘的精品！我知道的這個就是我讀《月亮和六便士》的感悟！我作下我殘酷的决定放棄化學從而轉嚮文學就是因為這個緣故。我也許更適合搞文學。
我感激我在大一那次靈魂的顫慄！《月亮和六便士》主人公思特裏剋蘭德那“曠野的呼喊”終於讓我認識到了自我。
作傢就是這樣的一種人，他們把人類的智慧發現後用作品表現出來。我自己是學習化學的。我自己很難均衡文科與理科的思維。理科講的是科學。科學真的是個很麻煩的詞語。嚴格意義上說衹有能用數學公式表達的東西纔是科學。科學越來越教我懷疑？懷疑所謂的科學？所謂的科學根本解决不了人類的問題！我不想藉文學來闡釋科學。我多言了。
房子裏的光綫特別暗，仿佛是，他突然走入了一個神的世界；蒙蒙朧朧中，他好象覺得自己正置於一個原始森林中，大樹下倘徉着一些赤身裸體的人。特拉斯醫生幾乎連呼吸都停止了，過了一會兒他纔知道，他看到的是四壁上巨大的壁畫。他心中出現了一種既無法理解又不能分析的感情。這幅畫具有壓人的氣勢，它既是肉欲的，又充滿無限熱情，與此同時又含着某種恐懼成分......繪製這幅巨作的人已經深入到大自然的隱秘中，知道了一般人所不知道的事物。他畫的是某種原始的令人震懾的東西，既美的驚人，又污穢邪惡，他的畫奇異而荒誕，好像宇宙初創時的圖景----伊甸園，亞當和夏娃……
“上帝啊，這是天才” 特拉斯醫生掩口驚呼。
這個原文的話，感謝作者道出了真理的話，藝術是屬於天才的！這個是震撼靈魂的話語！
有兩本相似的小說《月亮和六便士》和塞林格的《麥田的守望者》。這兩個小說的主人公有着驚人的相似。
《月亮和六便士》不乏精彩的句子。如：
“世界是冷酷無情的、殘酷的。我們生到人世間沒有人知道為了什麽，我們死後沒有人知道到何處去。我們必須自甘卑屈。我們必須看到冷清寂寥的美妙。在生活中我們一定不要出風頭、露頭角，惹起命運對我們註目。讓我們去尋求那些淳樸、敦厚的人的愛情吧。他們的愚昧遠比我們的知識更為可貴。讓我們保持着沉默，滿足於自己小小的天地，像他們一樣平易溫順吧。這就是生活的智慧。”
“在愛這種感情中主要成分是溫柔。愛情中需要有一種軟弱無力的感覺，要有體貼愛護的要求，有幫助別人、取悅別人的熱情——如果不是無私，起碼是巧妙地遮掩起來的自私；愛情包含着某種程度的靦腆怯懦。……愛情要占據一個人莫大的精力，它要一個人離開自己的生活專門去做一個愛人。即使頭腦最清晰的人，從道理上他可能知道，在實際中卻不會承認愛情有一天會走到盡頭。愛情賦予他明知是虛幻的事物以實質形體，他明知道這一切不過是鏡花水月，愛它卻遠遠超過喜愛真實。它使一個人比原來的自我更豐富了一些，同時又使他比原來的自我更狹小了一些。他不再是一個人，他成了追求某一個他不瞭解的目的的一件事物、一個工具。……”
“我們每個人生在世界上都是孤獨的。每個人都被囚禁在一座鐵塔裏，衹能靠一些符號同別人傳達自己的思想；而這些符號並沒有共同的價值，因此它們的意義是模糊的、不確定的。我們非常可憐地想把自己心中的財富傳送給別人，但是他們卻沒有接受這些財富的能力。因此我們衹能孤獨地行走，儘管身體互相依傍卻並不在一起，既不瞭解別的人也不能為別人所瞭解。我們好像住在異國的人，對於這個國傢的語言懂得非常少，雖然我們有各種美妙的、深奧的事情要說，卻衹能局限於會話手册上那幾句陳腐、平庸的話。我們的腦子裏充滿了各種思想，而我們能說得衹不過是像‘園丁的姑母有一把傘在屋子裏’這類話。”
張賢亮在〈緑化樹〉中說：“凡是出現兩次的事物必有某種意義，那就是命運！”
文學，文學真的是很難言的東西，它如此另人費解，它不是靠智力，不是靠理性可以把握的。科學最大的弊端是可以模仿。即使你很笨，你仍然可以在科學上做出成績，尤其是化學！而文學則不然！這個也許就是文學的魅力！它如此令我癡迷！尼采說：“模仿無疑於自殺”。科學的本質正是模仿。
Plot summary
The novel is written largely from the point of view of the narrator, who is first introduced to the character of Strickland through his (Strickland's) wife and strikes him (the narrator) as unremarkable. Certain chapters are entirely composed of the stories or narrations of others which the narrator himself is recalling from memory (selectively editing or elaborating on certain aspects of dialogue, particularly Strickland's, as Strickland is said by the narrator to be limited in his use of verbiage and tended to use gestures in his expression).
Strickland, a well-off, middle-class stock broker in London some time in the late 19th or the first half of the 20th century. Early in the novel, he leaves his wife and children and goes to Paris, living a destitute but defiantly content life there as an artist (specifically a painter), lodging in run-down hotels and falling prey to both illness and hunger. Strickland, in his drive to express through his art what appears to continually possess and compel him inside, cares nothing for physical comfort and is generally ignorant to his surroundings, but is generously supported while in Paris by a commercially successful yet unexceptional Dutch painter, Dirk Stroeve, a friend of the narrator's, who immediately recognizes Strickland's genius. After helping Strickland recover from a life-threatening condition, Stroeve is repaid by having his wife, Blanche, abandon him for Strickland. Strickland later discards the wife (all he really sought from Blanche was a model to paint, not serious companionship, and it is hinted in the novel's dialogue that he indicated this to her and she took the risk anyway), who then commits suicide - yet another human casualty (the first ones being his own established life and those of his wife and children) in Strickland's single-minded pursuit of Art and Beauty.
After the Paris episode, the story continues in Tahiti. Strickland has already died, and the narrator attempts to piece together his life there from the recollections of others. He finds that Strickland had taken up with a native woman, had at least one child by her (only a son is directly referenced) and started painting profusely. We learn that Strickland had settled for a short while in the French port of Marseilles before traveling to Tahiti, where he lived for a few years before finally dying of leprosy. Strickland left behind numerous paintings, but his magnum opus, which he painted on the walls of his hut in a half-crazed state of leprosy-induced blindness, was burnt down after his death by his wife by his dying orders.
Inspiration
The inspiration for this story, Gauguin, is considered to be the founder of primitivism in art. The main differences between Gauguin and Strickland are that Gauguin was French rather than English, and whilst Maugham describes the character of Strickland as being largely ignorant of his contemporaries in Modern art (as well as largely ignorant of other artists in general), Gauguin himself was well acquainted with Van Gogh. How many of the details of the story are based on fact is not known. However, Maugham had visited the place where Gauguin lived in Tahiti, and purchased some glass panels painted by Gauguin in his final days.
About the title
According to some sources, the title, the meaning of which is not explicitly revealed in the book, was taken from a review of Of Human Bondage in which the novel's protagonist, Philip Carey, is described as "so busy yearning for the moon that he never saw the sixpence at his feet." Presumably Strickland's "moon" is the idealistic realm of Art and Beauty, while the "sixpence" represents human relationships and the ordinary pleasures of life.
Adaptations
The book was filmed by Albert Lewin in 1943. The film stars George Sanders as Charles Strickland.
The novel served as the basis for an opera, also titled The Moon and Sixpence, by John Gardner to a libretto by Patrick Terry; it was premiered at Covent Garden in 1958.
Writer S Lee Pogostin adapted it for American TV in 1959. It starred Laurence Olivier
In popular culture
In the opening scene of Francois Truffaut's cinematic adaptation of Fahrenheit 451, several firemen are preparing books for burning. In the crowd of onlookers is a little boy who picks up one of the books and thumbs through it before his father takes it from him and throws it on the pile with the rest. That book is The Moon and Sixpence.
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