2019年5月25日-2019年7月28日:52章节;9小时;英文原版
If you look on the ground in search of a sixpence, you don't look up, and so miss the moon.
在当下的小说阅读推荐中,人们会把小说《月亮与六便士》放在前列,我通常看到的推荐词,也都是把月亮比作人的理想,把六便士比喻为现实的生活。有些人选择了理想,有些人选择了生活,小说《月亮与六便士》被神化为一个答案之书。仿佛读完此书,就可以开始对自己的人生和选择重新思考了。我以为书中会有很多的金句和可借鉴的名言,会出现理想和现实的冲突的画面,从而有冲突性和戏剧性。但是并没有,作者从他人的叙述,自己的交谈,片面式的介绍了Strickland在婚后的第17个年头离开温暖舒适的伦敦的家,开始练习成为一个画家。在文中作者也强调,自己的叙述也许不够全面,但是他还是想要记录这样他。
Strickland突然支身前往巴黎,谣言四起,中年人追逐艺术实在可笑,被年轻貌美的姑娘吸引从而私奔才稍显合理,即便这个理由很荒唐,但是更加符合常理。Mrs. Strickland拜托“我”前往巴黎找他,并且传达自己可以不计前嫌地愿望,只要他能够回头是岸。我肩负重任前往巴黎,通过种种迹象,以及同Strickland的面谈,我不得不承认,他就是单纯的想要画画了。女人,财富,都已经不再能够诱惑他。
Strickland在巴黎待了几年,他经常做零散的杂事,挣一点钱就去买画画的材料,开心了就去喝酒,下棋。Strickland不是要靠画画挣钱,他从来不向前人学习,他总是自己一点点琢磨已经被别人广而告之的画画技巧,他也从来不把自己的画拿出去卖。画完了要么就收起来,要么就毁了,不够爱惜,他更爱惜自己对艺术的触觉。
如此的穷困潦倒也掩饰不了他身上散发出的魅力,有些神秘和原始,同周边的浮躁不同,很容易吸引人,更容易激起女人的保护欲望,所以prostitutes, Blanche, Ata都是很爱他,爱而不得也爱。看到Strickland如此轻视和怠慢女性,我就很生气,他可真是自大。可他的眼中,其他人都是不值一提的,妻子是,子女是,朋友也是,人都不是他关心的。
一直到书的最后,他还是让人不够舒坦。但是他留下了让世人舒坦和惊叹的画作:
The demon which possessed him was exorcised at last, and with the completion of the work, for which all his life had been a painful preparation, rest descended on his remote and tortured soul.
He was willing to die, for he had fulfilled his purpose.
作品给人的感受:
It was strange and fantastic. It was a vision of the beginnings of the world, the Garden of Eden, with Adam and Eve --que sais-je.
It was a hymn to the beauty of the human form, male and female, and the praise of Nature, sublime, indifferent, lovely and cruel.
It gave you an awful sense of the infinity of the space and of the endlessness of time.
Michael Angelo 米开朗琪罗
作者没有强调月亮与六便士,哪个比较起来更好,只是月亮总是让人心里更加的敞亮,就像是最后,作者自己无意识地想到Strickland生活在Tahiti的儿子:
I do not know why I suddenly thought of Strickland's son by Ata. They had told me he was a merry, light-hearted youth.
I saw him, with my mind's eye, on the schooner on which he worked, wearing nothing but a pair of dungarees;
and at night, when the boat sailed along easily before a light breeze, and the sailors were gathered on the upper deck, while the captain and the supercargo lolled in deckchairs, smoking their pipes, I saw him dance with another lad, dance wildly, to the wheezy music of the concertina.
Above was the blue sky, and the stars, and all about the desert of the Pacific Ocean.
我们总是基于种种原因选择了自己的生活,小哪吒说,我命由我不由天。电影里有夸大的成分 ,但是也正是如此,我们自己根据各种考量做了选择,选择之后值不值得,只有自己知道。即使Strickland没有身前获得名利,他也已经完成了生命的洗礼,他的灵魂,走的干干净净。