Books like

Books like The Moon and Sixpence

12 books with a reading profile close to The Moon and Sixpence by W. Somerset Maugham. Deep and thought-provoking; a moderate read.

1

The Beautiful and Damned

by F. Scott Fitzgerald

Also thought-provoking · literary, classic literature

Set in the shifting social landscape of 1910s New York, the narrative follows Anthony Patch, the presumptive heir to a massive tycoon fortune, and his marriage to the socialite Gloria Gilbert.
2

An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge

by Ambrose Bierce

Also thought-provoking · literary, classic literature

Farquhar, a Southern planter, is being hanged for attempting to sabotage an Owl Creek bridge during the Civil War.
3

Tartuffe

by Molière

Also deep and thought-provoking · literary, classic literature

In seventeenth-century Paris, a wealthy patriarch named Orgon falls under the spell of Tartuffe, a man posing as a pious ascetic.
4

A Handful of Dust

by Evelyn Waugh

Also deep and thought-provoking · literary, classic literature

Tony Last is a gentle English country gentleman who lives at Hetton Abbey, a Gothic mansion he loves, with his wife Brenda and young son John Andrew.
5

Washington Square

by Henry James

Also deep and thought-provoking · literary, classic literature

In the affluent backdrop of mid-nineteenth-century New York, Catherine Sloper lives under the scrutiny of her father, Austin, a prominent physician who views his daughter as dull and unremarkable.
6

The Story of an Hour

by Kate Chopin

Also thought-provoking · literary, classic literature

Set in 1894, the narrative follows Louise Mallard as she receives news of her husband Brently’s death in a railroad disaster.
7

The Complete Fairy Tales

by Oscar Wilde

Also thought-provoking · literary, classic literature

This collection brings together stories including The Happy Prince, The Selfish Giant, and The Nightingale and the Rose.
8

Portnoy’s Complaint

by Philip Roth

Also deep and thought-provoking · literary, classic literature

Alexander Portnoy lies on a psychoanalyst’s couch and delivers a frantic, obscene monologue regarding his sexual frustrations and childhood hangfires.
9

The Portable Oscar Wilde

by Richard Aldington, Oscar Wilde

literary, classic literature

This 1946 compilation preserves the breadth of Oscar Wilde’s literary output, moving beyond his reputation as a mere wit.
10

God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater

by Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

Also thought-provoking · literary, classic literature

Eliot Rosewater, the alcoholic heir to a massive industrial fortune, abandons high society to relocate to a decaying town in Indiana.
11

Schoolgirl

by Osamu Dazai

Also thought-provoking · literary, classic literature

The novella that first propelled Dazai into the literary elite of post-war Japan, Schoolgirl was essentially the start of his career and gained notoriety for its ironic and inventive use of language.
12

The complete poetical works

by Robert Burns

Also deep · literary, classic literature

Robert Burns’s 1786 collection, originally titled Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect, documents the intersection of rural labor and linguistic identity.

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