Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0011663, Tue, 9 Aug 2005 17:02:19 -0700

Subject
Fwd: RE: Opening of SPEAK, MEMORY
Date
Body
ED RESPONSE. I think it is very likely that VN "read Montaigne." After all, he
had a Cambridge degree in French lit. I suspect "his" opening metaphor in SM
probably has multiple antecedents. Other suggestions?
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----- Forwarded message from pennyparkerpark@hotmail.com -----
Date: Tue, 09 Aug 2005 21:24:17 -0230
From: Dane Gill <pennyparkerpark@hotmail.com>
Reply-To: Dane Gill <pennyparkerpark@hotmail.com>

Was VN known to have read Montaigne? Or is this a coincidence?

Dane

>From: "D. Barton Johnson"
>Reply-To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
>To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
>Subject: Opening of SPEAK, MEMORY
>Date: Tue, 9 Aug 2005 16:45:56 -0700
>
>EDNOTE. Reflections on reading Montaigne in Saint-Petersburg:
>
>
>Nabokov. "The cradle rocks above the abyss, and common sense tells
us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two
eternities of darkness."
>
>Montaigne. "..why do we, from this instant which is but a flash in
the infinite course of an eternal night, and so short an interuption
of our perpetual and natural condition, death possessing all that
passed before and all the future of this moment, and also a good part
of the moment itself, derive the title of Being?"
>

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