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Dirk Stroeve
Blanche Stroeve is a tall Englishwoman who, though not beautiful, has an attractive and statuesque figure. She once worked as a nurse. Later, while working as a governess for an aristocratic Italian family, she was seduced and impregnated by the family’s heir. When the family discovered the relationship, they threw her out in the street. Blanche was “rescued” through marriage to kindly but ridiculous Dutch painter Dirk Stroeve, who adores her. Later, the pair moves to Paris, where they meet English painter Charles Strickland. Blanche professes to loathe Strickland for his rudeness to her husband, and when Stroeve asks whether they can take a sick Strickland into their home to nurse him, Blanche initially refuses, saying that she hates Strickland and senses that something terrible will happen if he lives with them. Yet after Stroeve wears her down, she agrees to nurse Strickland. Her initial antipathy to Strickland may have masked a strong sexual attraction, as during Strickland’s convalescence in her home, she falls in love with and begins an affair with him. When Stroeve asks Strickland to leave the apartment after Strickland has recovered, Blanche abruptly announces that she’s leaving with him. During her affair with Strickland, he paints a masterful nude of her—after which he decides he is finished with her. Blanche attempts suicide by drinking oxalic acid, and she eventually dies after a week-long hospitalization.
Blanche Stroeve Quotes in The Moon and Sixpence
The The Moon and Sixpence quotes below are all either spoken by Blanche Stroeve or refer to Blanche Stroeve . For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapters 1–16 Quotes
Her black dress, simple to austerity, suggested her bereaved condition, and I was innocently astonished that notwithstanding a real emotion she was able to dress the part she had to play according to her notions of seemliness.
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Chapters 17–42 Quotes
“Beauty is something wonderful and strange that the artist fashions out of the chaos of the world in the torment of his soul. And when he has made it, it is not given to all to know it. To recognize it you must repeat the adventure of the artist.”
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Their life in its own way was an idyll, and it managed to achieve a singular beauty.
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[T]here was in his face an outrageous sensuality; but, though it sounds nonsense, it seemed as though his sensuality were curiously spiritual.
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Blanche Stroeve was in the cruel grip of appetite. Perhaps she hated Strickland still, but she hungered for him, and everything that had made up her life till then became of no account. She ceased to be a woman, complex, kind, and petulant, considerate and thoughtless; she was a Maenad.
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“Women are constantly trying to commit suicide for love, but generally they take care not to succeed. It’s generally a gesture to arouse pity or terror in their lover.”
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Strickland had burst the bonds that hitherto had held him. […] It was not only the bold simplification of the drawing which showed so rich and so singular a personality; it was not only the painting, though the flesh was painted with a passionate sensuality which had in it something miraculous; it was not only the solidity, so that you felt extraordinarily the weight of the body; there was also a spirituality, troubling and new[.]
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It may be that in rogues the writer gratifies instincts deep-rooted in him, which the manners and customs of a civilized world have forced back to the mysterious recesses of the subconscious. In giving to the character of his invention flesh and bones he is giving life to that part of himself which finds no other means of expression. His satisfaction is a sense of liberation.
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“She had a wonderful body, and I wanted to paint a nude. When I’d finished my picture I took no more interest in her.”
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Chapters 43–58 Quotes
Here lies the unreality of fiction. For in men, as a rule, love is but an episode which takes its place among the other affairs of the day, and the emphasis laid on it in novels gives it an importance which is untrue to life […] As lovers, the difference between men and women is that women can love all day long, but men only at times.
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I suppose that art is a manifestation of the sexual instinct […]. It is possible that Strickland hated the normal release of sex because it seemed to him brutal by comparison with the satisfaction of artistic creation.
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“She leaves me alone […]. She cooks my food and looks after her babies. She does what I tell her. She gives me what I want from a woman.”
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Blanche Stroeve Character Timeline in The Moon and Sixpence
The timeline below shows where the character Blanche Stroeve appears in The Moon and Sixpence. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapters 17–42
...19. When the narrator visits Stroeve’s studio, Stroeve greets him joyously and introduces him to Mrs. Stroeve , a woman with a statuesque body. Mrs. Stroeve is affectionate toward Stroeve, but the...
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When the narrator asks whether Stroeve knows Strickland, Mrs. Stroeve says, “Beast.” Stroeve explains that he once asked Strickland to come see his paintings. Strickland...
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...He offers to take the narrator to meet Strickland at a café Strickland frequents. When Mrs. Stroeve caustically comments that some Dutch buyers thought Stroeve was joking when he showed them Strickland’s...
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...with other authors and with his friends, particularly Stroeve and Mrs. Stroeve, whose name is Blanche. The narrator senses that Blanche is hiding something, yet she and Stroeve get on well;...
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...Paris at that time are of the Stroeves’ household: Stroeve’s real passion for his wife (Blanche) and their domestic harmony, which has “a singular beauty” that Stroeve’s buffoonery only makes somehow...
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...25. After tending to Strickland, Stroeve and the narrator go back to Stroeve’s. Stroeve asks Blanche whether they can nurse Strickland at their place. Blanche refuses, claiming to hate Strickland and...
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...26. The narrator and Stroeve move Strickland to Stroeve’s. Though Strickland is ungrateful, Stroeve and Blanche nurse him assiduously. When the narrator asks Blanche whether she talks to Strickland and whether...
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...28. A week later, Stroeve visits the narrator at his apartment and announces, crying, that Blanche has left him because she loves Strickland. The narrator, disbelieving, asks for the whole story....
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...29. When the narrator is disgusted by Stroeve’s “weakness,” Stroeve explains that he couldn’t let Blanche live the way Strickland lives—he still loves her and will take her back if her...
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When the narrator asks whether Stroeve suspected Strickland and Blanche’s affair, Stroeve says he knew before Blanche did—he was aware she didn’t reciprocate his passion...
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Chapter 30. The narrator, unable to sleep, ponders Blanche. He concludes that she never loved Stroeve, only passively responded to his passion and protection,...
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While the narrator acknowledges that his speculations about Blanche may be wrong, he can at least come up with explanations for her behavior. Yet...
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Chapter 31. The next day, Stroeve goes to fetch his things from the studio. Blanche has given Stroeve’s things to the porter and is herself absent. A few days later,...
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...doesn’t see him for a few weeks. Then, one day, he runs into Strickland and Blanche on the street. The narrator is cold to them—so Strickland perversely insists on talking to...
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...later, Stroeve, who heard from an acquaintance that the narrator was at a café with Blanche, visits the narrator and asks to hear about his wife. When the narrator says he...
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...herself.” After the narrator shakes him and makes him drink some water, Stroeve explains that Blanche and Strickland had a fight, he left her, and she drank oxalic acid—she’s actually not...
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...The narrator makes Stroeve stay at his apartment. The next time they visit the hospital, Blanche refuses to see either of them. Stroeve asks the nurse to tell Blanche that if...
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Chapter 36. Over the next week, it becomes clear that Blanche won’t survive. One evening, Stroeve arrives at the narrator’s looking depleted, and the narrator knows...
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Chapter 37. The narrator attends Blanche’s funeral with Stroeve. Afterward, he feels “bored with a tragedy that did not really concern”...
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...mourning look goofy. Stroeve announces that he’s going home to Holland—the mockery of others and Blanche’s infidelity have weighed him down too much. He tells the narrator about how his carpenter...
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Chapter 39. Stroeve tells the narrator how he went to the studio after Blanche’s funeral. From the police, Stroeve knew that Strickland had left Blanche right after dinner—yet he...
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...When the narrator is shocked into silence, Stroeve says that he and Strickland both loved Blanche—and Holland’s simplicity might be good for Strickland. Strickland refused but gave Stroeve the nude of...
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...curiosity” about him. The narrator states that he heard Strickland gave Stroeve the nude of Blanche. In response to further questioning, Strickland says he only gave the painting to Stroeve because...
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When the narrator asks why Strickland would destroy Stroeve and Blanche’s life, Strickland says that Blanche would never have forgiven Stroeve, regardless: while working as a...
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The narrator asks why Strickland even “bothered with” Blanche. Furiously, Strickland admits that he desired her—but then, retreating to humor, explains how she was...
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When the narrator retorts that Blanche loved Strickland, Strickland angrily rants that love is “weakness” and women are just “instruments of...
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When the narrator calls Strickland inhumane, Strickland asks whether the narrator actually cares that Blanche died. After a pause, the narrator says he’s “ashamed” that he himself doesn’t care about...
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The narrator reflects unhappily that Stroeve and Blanche’s tragedy does seem “useless”—Stroeve will get over it, and Blanche might as well never have...
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...Aloud, he tells Strickland that he understands now why Strickland “surrendered” to his lust for Blanche—he had a momentary lapse in bravery in his quest for some ideal, and he sought...
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Chapters 43–58
...by describing his difficulties. The narrator knows nothing about the three months Strickland cohabited with Blanche, though he imagines a desperate Blanche trying to “ensnare” an indifferent Strickland with material “comfort.”...
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