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Re: Query: VN and Pale Fire, Martin Gardner and Annotated Alice
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Martin Gardner has published other "annotated" books. There is the
series
about "The Annotated Innocence of Father Brown" and another Chesterton (
"The Man who was Thursday"), for example.
Susan Elizabeth Sweeney added an EDNOTE where she points out that "the
VN -
MG connection is worth exploring further, although there were certainly
more
immediate and fundamental influences for VN's thinking about annotating
works of literature, including his own commentary on Pushkin's Eugene
Onegin."
There were also much older "annotated books", unfortunately I cannot
remember any of them to list here with certainty. There are, of course,
extensive foot-notes for Shakespeare, etc and even Samuel Johnson's own
encyclopedic (indirect)commentaries may count.
I have no access to great libraries, as most of you do and will be able
to
check.
And yet, there is something else I remember reading: Nabokov himself
explaining wherein lies the originality of his "annotated pale fire".
His
words might settle the matter, if someone manages to find where he
expressed
them...
Jansy Mello
Search the archive: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/archives/nabokv-l.html
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
series
about "The Annotated Innocence of Father Brown" and another Chesterton (
"The Man who was Thursday"), for example.
Susan Elizabeth Sweeney added an EDNOTE where she points out that "the
VN -
MG connection is worth exploring further, although there were certainly
more
immediate and fundamental influences for VN's thinking about annotating
works of literature, including his own commentary on Pushkin's Eugene
Onegin."
There were also much older "annotated books", unfortunately I cannot
remember any of them to list here with certainty. There are, of course,
extensive foot-notes for Shakespeare, etc and even Samuel Johnson's own
encyclopedic (indirect)commentaries may count.
I have no access to great libraries, as most of you do and will be able
to
check.
And yet, there is something else I remember reading: Nabokov himself
explaining wherein lies the originality of his "annotated pale fire".
His
words might settle the matter, if someone manages to find where he
expressed
them...
Jansy Mello
Search the archive: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/archives/nabokv-l.html
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