Subject
Re: QUERY: Mournful Monsters]
From
Date
Body
Date: Fri, 4 Jul 2008 08:25:30 -0400From: nabokv-l@UTK.EDUSubject: Re: [NABOKV-L] QUERY: Mournful Monsters]To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
-------- Original Message --------
Subject:
Re: QUERY: Mournful Monsters
Date:
Thu, 03 Jul 2008 18:27:05 -0700
From:
Matthew Roth <mroth@MESSIAH.EDU>
To:
NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
VN: "Some of my characters are, no doubt, pretty beastly, but I really don't care, they are outside my inner self like the mournful monsters of a cathedral façade - demons placed there merely to show that they have been booted out."
LH: If they have been booted out, then it means that they used to be inside: VN admits that there is some relation between his inner self and his monstrous characters.
M Roth: "...eliminated from his intrinsic self by the same forces of perfection which purified and chiseled his verse. He was his own cancellation." So was VN, artistically at least, his own cancellation?
LH: The bringing together of the two metaphors indicates that it is the practice of his art which enabled VN to perfect and keep his inner self pure.
Laurence Hochard
VN: "they are outside my inner self like the mournful monsters of a cathedral façade - demons placed there merely to show that they have been booted out."MR: This has always seemed to me a version of the thought expressed by Kinbote regarding John Shade's appearance: "His misshapen body, that gray mop of abundant hair, the yellow nails of his pudgy fingers, the bags under his lustreless eyes, were only intelligible if regarded as the waste products eliminated from his intrinsic self by the same forces of perfection which purified and chiseled his verse. He was his own cancellation." So was VN, artistically at least, his own cancellation?Matt Roth
Search the archive
Contact the Editors
Visit "Nabokov Online Journal"
Visit Zembla
View Nabokv-L Policies
Manage subscription options
All private editorial communications, without exception, are read by both co-editors.
_________________________________________________________________
Découvrez les profils Messenger de vos amis
http://home.services.spaces.live.com/
Search archive with Google:
http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=site:listserv.ucsb.edu&HL=en
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Visit "Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
Manage subscription options: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/