Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0016677, Sun, 6 Jul 2008 10:00:48 -0300

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Re: THOUGHTS: artists don't have to be consistent...or do
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Fran Assa [ on JM: VN's explicit opinions about psychoanalysis were apparently informed only by his contact with Freud's very early writings ...he actually was a true Freudian inspite of himself & BK:Nabokov had a good deal of what can now be known as contemporary psychoanalytic knowledge drawn from various schools, and is a "true Freudian" (since that is the phrase you used) but he did insist on separating literature from science, or on vexing and playing with that question, enchantingly adding humor and philosophy to his magical fairy tales.] You are both being very unscientific: almost as unscientific as Sigmund himself, in spite of his sincere pretensions. Clearly what you see as VN's psychoanalytical leanings, are simply his leaning, as did Siggy, on a huge foundation of Western culture, informed by Christianity, that teaches that we have a divided inner self, that we are part devil and part angel. They are both looking at the same sources. It's like bugs developing wings, and birds developing wings: the two are evolutionarily distinct phenomenon.

JM: I have no pretension to speak like a scientist. I agree with Fran that both Freud and Nabokov shared the same sources extracted from "the huge foundation of Western Culture" but, unlike me, their culture, intelligence and, mainly, their roots enabled them to drink from wider sources. There's nothing more I can argue since the greatest part of Fran's commentary elludes me completely.

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