Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0019457, Fri, 19 Feb 2010 17:35:28 -0200

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Re: QUERY: Red Wop Explained
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C. Kunin:I fail to see what is the link between the apparently explosive powder/red wop and Hazel?

JM: Once in a while I've the feeling that Kinbote bears traits inspired in how Nabokov sees critic E.Wilson.
By his own admission, Kinbote notices that he has something in common with Hazel (twisting of words).
Hazel twists T.S. Eliot into "Toilest" and "Powder" into "Red Wop." This practice is part of Bunny-Volodya exchanges, long before Hazel was born. Perhaps this element shared by Hazel and Kinbote is a jest with E.Wilson and their supreptitious envious "ban"s?

I'll quote only from page 249 (letter 192, Feb.1949) VN addressed to Bunny:
Do you still work upon such sets
as for example "step" and "pets,"
as "Nazitrap" and "partizan,"
"Red Wop" and "powder," "nab" and "ban"?

(And gosh! here we find "pets" and "powder" exploding in the same "quadruplets"... more amusing coincidences?)
More about "amphisbaeniae" on page 241 ( VN's: stupor/Proust) and E.Wilson's comment on pg. 244 ("stupor fits, not Proust, but reputes, or better, rope Utes...")



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