Subject
Fw: pynchon-l-digest V2 #3526 Pale Fire
From
Date
Body
----- Original Message -----
From: "pynchon-l-digest" <owner-pynchon-l-digest@waste.org>
To: <pynchon-l-digest@waste.org>
Sent: Monday, September 01, 2003 9:14 PM
Subject: pynchon-l-digest V2 #3526
>
> pynchon-l-digest Monday, September 1 2003 Volume 02 : Number
3526
>
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>> From: "Don Corathers" <gumbo@fuse.net>
> Subject: NPPF Comm 2: My bedroom, part 2
>
> Continuing.
>
> p 109-110
>
> "... His bachelor bedroom, a splendid spacious circular apartment at the
top
> of the high and massive South West Tower." This is the same room, Kinbote
> confirms a few pages later, where the king was confined during the
"tedious
> and unnecessary Zemblan Revolution." And the room from which his father
used
> to slip away for greenroom trysts with Iris Acht.
>
>
> p 110
>
> "... a coverlet of genuine giant panda fur that had just been rushed from
> Tibet... " Even in 1936 this must have been ecologically insensitive.
>
> viola d'amore. [It., viol of love, ca. 1700] : a tenor viol having usually
> seven gut and seven wire strings. (MW10)
>
> "... Occasionally fishing out of the nether recesses of his seat a pair of
> old-fashioned motoring goggles, a black opal ring, a ball of silver
> chocolate wrapping, or the star of a foreign order." Lot of Daddy Alfin's
> stuff down in that chair. Is any of it important?
>
> "The sight of her four bare limbs and three mousepits (Zemblan anatomy)
> irritated him... " Once again Kinbote tries to portray his distaste for
> women as generally Zemblan, and does it with a coinage that perfectly
> captures the king's revulsion at something most boys would be pleased to
> see. Charles's rejection of Fleur contains another echo of Hazel, too: the
> entire three-day seduction attempt can be read as a skewed replay of
Hazel's
> blind date.
>
> cheval glass. a full-length mirror in a frame in which it may be tilted.
>
> Sudarg of Bokay. A reflection of the name of a glassmaker we know,
engraved
> on the surface of a "really fantastic mirror." It is problematical that
the
> mirror was made for Charles's grandfather, presumably quite some time ago.
> That would seem to make it impossible for our Jacob Gradus, born in 1915
and
> just 21at the time Fleur gazes at her reflection in the mirror, to be its
> craftsman. Perhaps it was made by his grandfather. Is Kinbote, the expert
on
> surnames who just a few notes ago was lecturing us about variants, unaware
> of this reference to Gradus? He seems to be.
>
> Whoever made the mirror invested it with magical power that not only
directs
> light but bends time: "a secret device of reflection gathered an infinite
> number of nudes in its depths, garlands of girls in graceful and sorrowful
> groups, diminishing in the limpid distance, or breaking into individual
> nymphs, some of whom, she murmured, must resemble her ancestors when they
> were young--little peasant garlien combing their hair in shallow water as
> far as the eye could reach, and then the wistful mermaid from an old tale,
> and then nothing." Quite a mirror. Quite a paragraph.
>
> putti. plural of putto [It., boy...] a figure of an infant boy esp. in
> European art of the Renaissance--usually used in plural. The precise
nature
> of Charles's sexual interests becomes more clear.
>
> Duchess of Payn? Anybody know where that duchy is?
>
> 1950 Exposition of Glass Animals. Another visit from Gradus, the
glassmaker.
>
>
>
> Line 85: Who'd seen the Pope (p113)
>
> Interesting that Kinbote, who is not Catholic (see 'our Zemblan brand of
> Protestantism," p 224) and has no reference materials at his disposal as
he
> writes the Commentary, has such an agile grasp of Vatican history.
>
>
> Lines 86-90: Aunt Maud
>
> I think this group is already a bit ahead of where the author expected his
> readers to be at this point in plumbing Maud's eccentricities.
>
> Don
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Date: Mon, 1 Sep 2003 19:13:26 -0700 (PDT)
> From: David Morris <fqmorris@yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: VLVL 4: War, politics and love
>
>>
> Date: Mon, 1 Sep 2003 22:54:57 -0400
> From: "Don Corathers" <gumbo@fuse.net>
> Subject: NPPF Comm 2: Recap, schedule, etc
>
> Friends--
>
> The discussion of the second part of the Pale Fire Commentary was
originally
> scheduled to start last Monday, August 25. And it did, but my first four
> posts were met with dead silence, which I interpreted as a symptom of
> late-August/pre-Labor Day absence and inattention. (It never occurred to
me
> that my notes might be getting an indifferent response because they were
so
> dreary.)
>
> Panicked by what seemed to be an empty room, I asked for a change in the
> schedule, which Vincent graciously made, delaying the start of the session
> until tomorrow, September 2. A few days after that change was made,
panicked
> by an empty inbox (empty of NPPF content, anyway), I reversed field and
> began posting the rest of my notes.
>
> As a result, my hosting session has been just a little bit scattered and
> attenuated. My apologies. If you're just now checking back in because
you've
> been out at the Hamptons or in Utana or wherever you go, or because you
> thought we were on break (which officially I guess we were), you may want
to
> use the archive locations below to review the notes. Not included in the
> list, but easy enough to find once you get into the August archive index,
> are some additional notes posted by the erudite Mr. Fidget.
>
> As for the schedule: no objection here to going back to the original plan
or
> some semblance of it, or anyway beginning the next session as soon as
> Jasper's ready to post his notes, which I suspect is probably right now.
> This novel uniquely demands to be considered all at once anyway--maybe we
> should consider compressing the reading schedule from the original
one-week
> per session scheme, letting them overlap.
>
> My notes, except for the last one, which isn't in the archive yet:
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=84805&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=84806&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=84807&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=84808&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=84906&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=85088&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=85090&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=85193&sort=date
>
> Don
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Date: Tue, 2 Sep 2003 00:06:15 -0400
> From: "Don Corathers" <gumbo@fuse.net>
> Subject: Re: NPPF Comm 2: Parents: some notes
>
> I know we agreed to disagree on this, but I'd like to disagree just a
little
> bit further.
>
>
> Rob:
>
> > Your thesis doesn't really seem to fit with the other mentions of Botkin
> > which Kinbote makes in the commentary;
>
> Not sure what you mean by this. Botkin turns up again in the Commentary on
p
> 267, in the context of an extended conversation about Kinbote's
resemblance
> to the king of Zembla and his true identity. Here it is:
>
> "Professor Pardon now spoke to me: 'I was under the impression that you
were
> born in Russia, and that your name was a kind of anagram of Botkin or
> Botkine?'
>
> "Kinbote: 'You are confusing me with some refugee from Nova Zembla'
> [sarcastically stressing the 'Nova'].
>
> "'Didn't you tell me, Charles, that kinbote means regicide in your
> language?' asked my dear Shade.
>
> "'Yes, a king's destroyer,' I said (longing to explain that a king who
sinks
> his identity in the mirror of exile is in a sense just that).
>
> "Shade [addressing the German visitor]: 'Professor Kinbote is the author
of
> a remarkable book on surnames...'"
>
> This exchange, coming after a discussion of Kinbote's resemblance to
> photographs of the King of Zembla, connects him to Botkin and then loops
> back to the earlier passage--the one on p. 100 we were discussing--with
the
> reference to Kinbote's expertise in surnames. And it invites us to explore
> his identity further. We know that he's not the King of Zembla. What about
> this guy Botkin?
>
> If we turn to the index we find Botkin has one of the more mysterious and
> provocative entries, with a string of references that connect the name to
> new mysteries and investigations.
>
> If Botkin is Kinbote's true identity, and I think we'll eventually
conclude
> that it is, it shouldn't be surprising that the references to him in the
> Commentary, which is Kinbote's text, are veiled. My thesis, which is kind
of
> a strong word for the point I was making, is that in the passage on p. 100
> as elsewhere (the cited passage on p 267, the Botkin entry in the index)
> Nabokov is pretty explicitly pointing us in directions that will help us
> open up his novel.
>
> Lukin, Locock, Luxon and Lukashevich
> > aren't names which refer to writers;
>
> But as Kinbote is pointing out, they're all derivatives of the Biblical
> Luke, who was a writer.
>
> Don
>
>
>
> - ----- Original Message -----
> From: "jbor" <jbor@bigpond.com>
> To: <pynchon-l@waste.org>
> Sent: Sunday, August 31, 2003 2:52 AM
> Subject: Re: NPPF Comm 2: Parents: some notes
>
>
> > on 31/8/03 3:09 PM, Don Corathers at gumbo@fuse.net wrote:
> >
> > > The inclusion of Botkin in a list of names where it doesn't really fit
> > > (three writers--four counting Luke--and a shoemaker) is a way of
> pointing at
> > > the name. Nabokov does this now and then, makes an odd intrusion or
has
> one
> > > of his characters say we shouldn't concern ourselves with X, which is
> > > usually a clear signal that we should check X out very carefully.
> > >
> > > And the paragraph is about how names change.
> >
> >
> > We'll just have to agree to disagree.
> >
> > best
> >
>
> ------------------------------
>
> End of pynchon-l-digest V2 #3526
> ********************************
>
> To unsubscribe, send a message to waste@waste.org
> with "unsubscribe pynchon-l-digest" in the message body.
From: "pynchon-l-digest" <owner-pynchon-l-digest@waste.org>
To: <pynchon-l-digest@waste.org>
Sent: Monday, September 01, 2003 9:14 PM
Subject: pynchon-l-digest V2 #3526
>
> pynchon-l-digest Monday, September 1 2003 Volume 02 : Number
3526
>
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>> From: "Don Corathers" <gumbo@fuse.net>
> Subject: NPPF Comm 2: My bedroom, part 2
>
> Continuing.
>
> p 109-110
>
> "... His bachelor bedroom, a splendid spacious circular apartment at the
top
> of the high and massive South West Tower." This is the same room, Kinbote
> confirms a few pages later, where the king was confined during the
"tedious
> and unnecessary Zemblan Revolution." And the room from which his father
used
> to slip away for greenroom trysts with Iris Acht.
>
>
> p 110
>
> "... a coverlet of genuine giant panda fur that had just been rushed from
> Tibet... " Even in 1936 this must have been ecologically insensitive.
>
> viola d'amore. [It., viol of love, ca. 1700] : a tenor viol having usually
> seven gut and seven wire strings. (MW10)
>
> "... Occasionally fishing out of the nether recesses of his seat a pair of
> old-fashioned motoring goggles, a black opal ring, a ball of silver
> chocolate wrapping, or the star of a foreign order." Lot of Daddy Alfin's
> stuff down in that chair. Is any of it important?
>
> "The sight of her four bare limbs and three mousepits (Zemblan anatomy)
> irritated him... " Once again Kinbote tries to portray his distaste for
> women as generally Zemblan, and does it with a coinage that perfectly
> captures the king's revulsion at something most boys would be pleased to
> see. Charles's rejection of Fleur contains another echo of Hazel, too: the
> entire three-day seduction attempt can be read as a skewed replay of
Hazel's
> blind date.
>
> cheval glass. a full-length mirror in a frame in which it may be tilted.
>
> Sudarg of Bokay. A reflection of the name of a glassmaker we know,
engraved
> on the surface of a "really fantastic mirror." It is problematical that
the
> mirror was made for Charles's grandfather, presumably quite some time ago.
> That would seem to make it impossible for our Jacob Gradus, born in 1915
and
> just 21at the time Fleur gazes at her reflection in the mirror, to be its
> craftsman. Perhaps it was made by his grandfather. Is Kinbote, the expert
on
> surnames who just a few notes ago was lecturing us about variants, unaware
> of this reference to Gradus? He seems to be.
>
> Whoever made the mirror invested it with magical power that not only
directs
> light but bends time: "a secret device of reflection gathered an infinite
> number of nudes in its depths, garlands of girls in graceful and sorrowful
> groups, diminishing in the limpid distance, or breaking into individual
> nymphs, some of whom, she murmured, must resemble her ancestors when they
> were young--little peasant garlien combing their hair in shallow water as
> far as the eye could reach, and then the wistful mermaid from an old tale,
> and then nothing." Quite a mirror. Quite a paragraph.
>
> putti. plural of putto [It., boy...] a figure of an infant boy esp. in
> European art of the Renaissance--usually used in plural. The precise
nature
> of Charles's sexual interests becomes more clear.
>
> Duchess of Payn? Anybody know where that duchy is?
>
> 1950 Exposition of Glass Animals. Another visit from Gradus, the
glassmaker.
>
>
>
> Line 85: Who'd seen the Pope (p113)
>
> Interesting that Kinbote, who is not Catholic (see 'our Zemblan brand of
> Protestantism," p 224) and has no reference materials at his disposal as
he
> writes the Commentary, has such an agile grasp of Vatican history.
>
>
> Lines 86-90: Aunt Maud
>
> I think this group is already a bit ahead of where the author expected his
> readers to be at this point in plumbing Maud's eccentricities.
>
> Don
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Date: Mon, 1 Sep 2003 19:13:26 -0700 (PDT)
> From: David Morris <fqmorris@yahoo.com>
> Subject: Re: VLVL 4: War, politics and love
>
>>
> Date: Mon, 1 Sep 2003 22:54:57 -0400
> From: "Don Corathers" <gumbo@fuse.net>
> Subject: NPPF Comm 2: Recap, schedule, etc
>
> Friends--
>
> The discussion of the second part of the Pale Fire Commentary was
originally
> scheduled to start last Monday, August 25. And it did, but my first four
> posts were met with dead silence, which I interpreted as a symptom of
> late-August/pre-Labor Day absence and inattention. (It never occurred to
me
> that my notes might be getting an indifferent response because they were
so
> dreary.)
>
> Panicked by what seemed to be an empty room, I asked for a change in the
> schedule, which Vincent graciously made, delaying the start of the session
> until tomorrow, September 2. A few days after that change was made,
panicked
> by an empty inbox (empty of NPPF content, anyway), I reversed field and
> began posting the rest of my notes.
>
> As a result, my hosting session has been just a little bit scattered and
> attenuated. My apologies. If you're just now checking back in because
you've
> been out at the Hamptons or in Utana or wherever you go, or because you
> thought we were on break (which officially I guess we were), you may want
to
> use the archive locations below to review the notes. Not included in the
> list, but easy enough to find once you get into the August archive index,
> are some additional notes posted by the erudite Mr. Fidget.
>
> As for the schedule: no objection here to going back to the original plan
or
> some semblance of it, or anyway beginning the next session as soon as
> Jasper's ready to post his notes, which I suspect is probably right now.
> This novel uniquely demands to be considered all at once anyway--maybe we
> should consider compressing the reading schedule from the original
one-week
> per session scheme, letting them overlap.
>
> My notes, except for the last one, which isn't in the archive yet:
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=84805&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=84806&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=84807&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=84808&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=84906&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=85088&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=85090&sort=date
>
> http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l&month=0308&msg=85193&sort=date
>
> Don
>
> ------------------------------
>
> Date: Tue, 2 Sep 2003 00:06:15 -0400
> From: "Don Corathers" <gumbo@fuse.net>
> Subject: Re: NPPF Comm 2: Parents: some notes
>
> I know we agreed to disagree on this, but I'd like to disagree just a
little
> bit further.
>
>
> Rob:
>
> > Your thesis doesn't really seem to fit with the other mentions of Botkin
> > which Kinbote makes in the commentary;
>
> Not sure what you mean by this. Botkin turns up again in the Commentary on
p
> 267, in the context of an extended conversation about Kinbote's
resemblance
> to the king of Zembla and his true identity. Here it is:
>
> "Professor Pardon now spoke to me: 'I was under the impression that you
were
> born in Russia, and that your name was a kind of anagram of Botkin or
> Botkine?'
>
> "Kinbote: 'You are confusing me with some refugee from Nova Zembla'
> [sarcastically stressing the 'Nova'].
>
> "'Didn't you tell me, Charles, that kinbote means regicide in your
> language?' asked my dear Shade.
>
> "'Yes, a king's destroyer,' I said (longing to explain that a king who
sinks
> his identity in the mirror of exile is in a sense just that).
>
> "Shade [addressing the German visitor]: 'Professor Kinbote is the author
of
> a remarkable book on surnames...'"
>
> This exchange, coming after a discussion of Kinbote's resemblance to
> photographs of the King of Zembla, connects him to Botkin and then loops
> back to the earlier passage--the one on p. 100 we were discussing--with
the
> reference to Kinbote's expertise in surnames. And it invites us to explore
> his identity further. We know that he's not the King of Zembla. What about
> this guy Botkin?
>
> If we turn to the index we find Botkin has one of the more mysterious and
> provocative entries, with a string of references that connect the name to
> new mysteries and investigations.
>
> If Botkin is Kinbote's true identity, and I think we'll eventually
conclude
> that it is, it shouldn't be surprising that the references to him in the
> Commentary, which is Kinbote's text, are veiled. My thesis, which is kind
of
> a strong word for the point I was making, is that in the passage on p. 100
> as elsewhere (the cited passage on p 267, the Botkin entry in the index)
> Nabokov is pretty explicitly pointing us in directions that will help us
> open up his novel.
>
> Lukin, Locock, Luxon and Lukashevich
> > aren't names which refer to writers;
>
> But as Kinbote is pointing out, they're all derivatives of the Biblical
> Luke, who was a writer.
>
> Don
>
>
>
> - ----- Original Message -----
> From: "jbor" <jbor@bigpond.com>
> To: <pynchon-l@waste.org>
> Sent: Sunday, August 31, 2003 2:52 AM
> Subject: Re: NPPF Comm 2: Parents: some notes
>
>
> > on 31/8/03 3:09 PM, Don Corathers at gumbo@fuse.net wrote:
> >
> > > The inclusion of Botkin in a list of names where it doesn't really fit
> > > (three writers--four counting Luke--and a shoemaker) is a way of
> pointing at
> > > the name. Nabokov does this now and then, makes an odd intrusion or
has
> one
> > > of his characters say we shouldn't concern ourselves with X, which is
> > > usually a clear signal that we should check X out very carefully.
> > >
> > > And the paragraph is about how names change.
> >
> >
> > We'll just have to agree to disagree.
> >
> > best
> >
>
> ------------------------------
>
> End of pynchon-l-digest V2 #3526
> ********************************
>
> To unsubscribe, send a message to waste@waste.org
> with "unsubscribe pynchon-l-digest" in the message body.