Douban 9.2, a dream-chasing story of a middle-aged man, poked everyone's desire.

Source | Book List (ID: Book Selection)

How should we spend this short life? Whether to pursue your dreams or step by step and turn like a screw.

For most people, there is never a correct answer to this question, so we can only take it one step at a time.

Although Gao said: Life is not only about the present, but also about poetry and distant fields.

In fact, a middle-aged man did this thing incisively and vividly: he abandoned his wife and children, gave up his happy family, picked up a brush and wandered abroad with 100 yuan.

From London to Paris and then to Tahiti in the South Pacific, he was poor, ill and promiscuous, robbed the benefactor's wife, abandoned all secular customs and shackles, and lived as a monster and genius in the eyes of others.

However, he spent the second half of his life according to his own ideas, injecting his whole life into painting and writing brilliant and amazing works of art with a brush.

This story is the novel The Moon and Sixpence by British writer Mao Mu.

Although, the man Charles strickland is a complete jerk, and he doesn't play cards according to common sense at all. But what I want to say is:

People who look up at the moon are not taller than ordinary people, and ordinary people are not necessarily more successful than those who look up at the moon.

Everyone has his own glory, and we can't compare with others.

However, on the road of chasing your dreams, courage and hope are enough to help you overcome obstacles and reach the forest in your heart.

When people reach middle age,

Give everything for your dream.

This man is strickland, a stockbroker in London. He has a rich and happy family. His wife is beautiful, sociable and often walks with artists. One son and one daughter are lively, healthy, smart and lovely. It stands to reason that people should be content with the status quo when they reach middle age.

However, on the 7th day after he married his wife, he left a letter and went to Paris. Abandoned a career and family that looked good to outsiders.

There is no explanation or apology in the letter. Just tell my wife: I have decided to leave you and never come back.

After reading this letter, my wife almost fainted and cried bitterly. The husband's behavior surprised his family and friends.

Because in the eyes of others, he is a kind, boring and honest ordinary person. In the eyes of his wife, although he lacks personality, he is a good citizen, a good husband and a good father. They can't believe that such a thing will happen to them.

Before that, my wife even planned the future of their family of four:

Hold hands with your husband and grow old with your son. Watching children grow up, get married and have children. The daughter married a good man and the son became an excellent soldier. Finally, they retired gloriously, lived a rich life, and were loved by their children and grandchildren until they reached the end of their lives.

This warm and ordinary future is also the dream of most people.

However, his wife's dream was shattered because of Strickland's departure. She firmly believes that her husband was taken away by another woman. With her knowledge of her husband, he would never do anything so outrageous. Someone else must have instigated it.

Everyone around me thinks so.

Surprisingly, strickland didn't run away with other women, let alone stay in luxury hotels for fun, but stayed in slums to draw pictures. And he did this just to fulfill a childhood dream: painting.

"But you are 40 years old. 」

"It is with this in mind that I think I should take immediate action. 」

"Painted before? 」

"When I was a child, I wanted to be a painter, but my father asked me to do business. He thought that doing art would not make money. A year ago, I tried to draw some. Last year, I went to night school. 」

When someone told him that it was too late to paint at 40. But your wife and children need you. They can't lose you.

Strickland told him categorically: I must draw. I can't help myself. When a person falls into the water, no matter how well he swims, whether he is good or not. He has to swim out anyway, or he will drown.

Although I didn't understand him, I was moved, as if I could feel the fierce struggle in his heart.

It's like lying in bed for countless nights, telling myself firmly that I want to write. This kind of power is very powerful, and it is the truest desire and appeal in one's heart.

The news made Strickland's wife furious.

Desperate and sad, she trembled and said, "If he left me for a woman, I can forgive him, but he left me for an ideal. I am unforgivable. 」

As Mao Mu said: Women are evenly matched, but they can't compete with their own ideals.

People who look up at the moon

Sometimes more despicable than ordinary people.

Strickland lives in poverty in Paris. He lives in a small attic and often has no food, but he never accepts anyone's sympathy. I am painting all the time except playing chess in front of a nearby cafe.

Surprisingly, he never paints for money, nor for fame, because he never lets others see his paintings. Instead, I burned all my passion on the canvas to record and express it.

For Dutch painters who admire strickland, his works are simply masterpieces.

So he often helped Strickland, and he was willing to tolerate the latter even if he was usually arrogant and rude to him. Even when Strickland was ill, he lent a helping hand.

As the painter said, "I respect genius, because there is nothing more wonderful than genius in the world." However, the innate talent is also a burden, and we must tolerate them and be patient with them. 」

However, strickland fell in love with his wife during the painter's illness at home.

Unexpectedly, he gave the marching orders, and his wife actually followed Strickland, determined and indifferent. In order not to make his wife too sad, the painter decided to give up the house and move out by himself.

The most infuriating thing is that strickland seems completely indifferent to all this.

Soon, he abandoned the Dutch painter's wife. Before the painter recovered, his wife drank oxalic acid and committed suicide.

However, the mastermind strickland seems to have nothing to do with her life. Didn't even go to the hospital to see her.

When someone asks him, do you have any regrets about her death? He said like an innocent love rat: Why should I regret it?

"Let me tell you this story. You're dying. It was the painter who took you to his house. Take care of you like parents. He sacrificed time, money and comfort for you. Saved you from the jaws of death 」

"It is his nature that he likes to help others. 」

"Even if you don't owe him kindness, you shouldn't pry away his wife, should you? People were always happy before you appeared. Why not let others live in peace? 」

"I am a man, and sometimes I need a woman. But I don't want love, that's a disadvantage. After my sexual desire is satisfied, I am ready to do other things. I can't conquer my desire, but I hate it It imprisoned my soul. Love is a disease. Women are my tools for pleasure. 」

Seeing this, we understand that Strickland didn't love the dead woman at all. Being with her is only because of a temporary lewd need, and his spirit is extremely disgusted with this need and ashamed of it.

As Mao Mu wrote in his book: At that time, I didn't know how complicated human nature was. I don't know how much affectation is contained in sincerity and how much meanness is contained in nobility. In other words, virtue can be found even in evil.

Just like strickland in the book, in order to pursue the painting world he yearned for, he violated the traditional right and wrong.

Some people say that he is inhuman, just like an animal, but others say that without his perseverance, there would be no great painter in this world.

Mao Mu once said: If an artist is endowed with a unique personality, I can forgive him even if he has a thousand shortcomings.

The Dutch painter who lost his wife has long understood this truth. Even though the other party directly led to the ruin of his family, when he saw the painting that Strickland left at home, he was so excited that he shed tears and called it a genius.

So, he chose to forgive Strickland.

Perhaps for most of us, we are Dutch painters, and we have been trying to achieve an ordinary life all our lives.

Therefore, when we see Strickland, our eyes will glow because our inner desires are awakened. In this changeable world, he looked up at the moon.

Dreams are a good thing.

May you and I have both.

The moon and sixpence are enduring hot topics in every era.

Because the moon represents lofty ideals for people, and sixpence refers to reality and life. Many times, people have to choose between the two.

Some people say: Strickland, who chose the moon, is terrible, dressed in rags, looked down upon by people and unkempt. I lost all sense of life, but I don't know what to say.

However, put aside the secular: do what you want to do most, live in your favorite environment and enjoy inner peace. Isn't that what each of us is after?

Fortunately, in the last stage of his life, Strickland found his true self in Tahiti with all his belongings, a canvas and a box of paints.

At this stage, he married an indigenous girl on the island and lived in a botanical garden full of coconut trees. This special experience provided him with something novel.

It seems that in this distant country, he left his body and found the home of his soul. Therefore, he painted a touching work.

This reminds me of a friend I once met in Tengchong. He gave up his rich life and came to a small corner of Yunnan Province from a first-tier city to paint. Before the divorce, he gave all his property to his wife and children and left home cleanly.

Once I asked him why he did it.

He said: I liked painting when I was a child, but my parents killed me in the cradle. After work, I was overwhelmed by the burden of life. Painting ran aground, but it was always in his mind and ran out from time to time. He decided to break up parts and really live for himself.

However, not everyone is as lucky as strickland and his friends. Most people wake up every morning and are bound by work, mortgage, children and parents.

Although there was Nezha's sentence before: My life is my decision. However, in the face of morality and responsibility, ideals have been weakened to the extreme.

Strickland eventually died of leprosy. Before he died, he painted the greatest work of his life in the house where he lived. Even if the doctor didn't know how to draw, he was completely conquered when he saw these murals on the wall. He cried and sighed: God, he is really a genius.

Even so, Strickland ordered the aboriginal wife to burn down the whole house, along with the murals.

This is also his greatness.

He created a world with his own hands and witnessed all its beauty. Finally, destroy it. Because, he lives to record those flashes, and painting is to fulfill a dream in his heart.

He is like those devout pilgrims on the Sichuan-Tibet line, one step at a time, chasing the holy land he yearns for.

In my opinion, life is valuable only when people take something precious as their goal in life.

In this world, there are 10,000 stories about success. If you ask me what I think, it depends on how you look at the meaning of life, on what obligations you think you should undertake to society and what you want from yourself.

There are 7 billion people on the earth, and everyone has his own moon in his heart. These precious things can't be measured by money, but every time you think of them, your heart will be filled with passion and tears.

Man, why must we pursue the moon?

I think: probably to find a lifestyle that suits you. Sixpence is a good thing, but not the best thing. We can't sacrifice the best thing for the second best thing.

There are the best things in the moon, which can take you to find your own life dimension, and also can take you through the jungle of thorns and reach the forest in your heart, so that you can avoid the wandering of your soul.

Dreams are a good thing. May you and I have them.

* This article is reproduced from a WeChat official account "Book Selection" (ID: Book Selection), which recommends good books. It was created by senior media people such as Southern Weekend and Beijing News to help you improve yourself and become better through reading.