"The Moon and Sixpence" by W. Somerset Maugham is a novel published in 1919. It follows Charles Strickland, a middle-aged English stockbroker who abruptly abandons his wife and children to pursue his obsession with becoming an artist. Living in poverty and indifferent to those around him, Strickland destroys relationships in his single-minded pursuit of art and beauty. Inspired by Paul Gauguin's life, the story explores the myth of the artist-genius through a journey from London to Paris to Tahiti.