The Gold of their Bodies

Gold of Their Bodies, first published in 1955, is a fascinating biography of Paul Gauguin (1848-1903), the French post-impressionist artist, most famous for his colorful paintings of life in Tahiti and the South Pacific. Although fictionalized by the addition of dialogue, Gold of Their Bodies draws from Gauguin’s own writings and accurately portrays the adult life of Gauguin—his struggles to make a living from his art, his friendships with Van Gogh, Cezanne, Pissaro, and other contemporaries, his travels and life with the native peoples of the South Pacific, his relationships with Polynesian women, and his run-ins with French colonial authorities. Gauguin, prolific in his output (in large part due to the small price he received for his works), and troubled by poor health in his later life, died at the relatively young age of 54 in the Marquesas Islands of French Polynesia. It was not until after his death that his works were recognized as masterpieces, and, in February 2015, one of his Tahitian paintings sold for the staggering price of $300 million dollars.