Talk:The Moon and Sixpence

Untitled
dream and reality in "SThe moon and sixpence "

Origin of the Title
Does anyone have any idea what the title, "The Moon and Sixpence" means, where it comes from, or what Maugham meant by it? I do not recognize it as a quote from anything. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.18.25.60 (talk) 19:54, 18 September 2007 (UTC) a song for sixpence. His picuture was only for a song. Must we pay for art? Moon means women. See Mother Goose. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.128.49.127 (talk) 06:52, 4 May 2009 (UTC)

I have removed the following from the section relating to the title, as it is unsupported by references and in my experience it is at least partly wrong.


 * Traditionally, shillings and pence were written together with a slash and quoted together. E.g. 1/6 was "one shilling and six pence". In the common case where there were no shillings but a zero was required, it became colloquially called the moon.

The line between the 1 and the 6 was not known as a slash when £sd was in use: it is a reduced form of a long "s" (for shillings/solidi) and is technically a solidus; further "1/6" was spoken "one and six" or "one and sixpence": see £sd. The form "0/6d" was rarely found, and I know of no authority for it being called a "moon". In any case, the digression does not help to explain the title at all.Thomas Peardew (talk) 14:46, 15 October 2015 (UTC)

Removed commercial plug
I have removed from the In popular culture section the following: "The Moon and Sixpence is the name of a popular Irish pub in Portland, Oregon." Reason: uncited claim, probable commercial plug. To reinstate this claim, provide a reliable reference proving its notable popularity. WP is an encyclopedia. David Spector (user/talk) 13:14, 1 March 2013 (UTC)