Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0006886, Mon, 7 Oct 2002 13:32:58 -0700

Subject
Fw: Course on Nabokov's Butterflies
Date
Body
----- Original Message -----
From: "Corinne Scheiner" <cscheiner@ColoradoCollege.edu>
To: "Vladimir Nabokov Forum" <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
>
> ----------------- Message requiring your approval (38
lines) ------------------
> In keeping with Don's request, here's the description of a new course I
> will be offering in the spring that may be of interest to some
> Nabokovians:
>
> CO 200 Nabokov's Butterflies
> In this course, students will examine the intersections between Vladimir
> Nabokov's work as a lepidopterist and his work as a writer. We will begin
> by reading Nabokov's autobiography, Speak, Memory: An Autobiography
> Revisited, to discover how these two interests pervaded Nabokov's life and
> his thoughts about the multiple "hats" he wore. We will move on to a
> study of the field of lepidoptera and the central questions contained
> therein, focusing particularly on pattern and mimicry. We will then read
> several of Nabokov's literary works--novels, short stories, and poems--and
> explore how these concepts and others drawn from the study of the natural
> world play out in his work as a writer. For example, how does Nabokov
> depict the natural world--and butterflies in particular--in his texts? how
> do the senses come together? what role does beauty play? Finally, we will
> take a week-long field trip in which we retrace one of Nabokov's own
> butterfly-hunting expeditions here in the Southwest and catch butterflies
> ourselves; given that Nabokov wrote Lolita during such an expedition, we
> will read Lolita as we do so.
>
> I will be team teaching the course with a biologist whose speciality is
> entomology and lepidoptera.
>
> Yours,
> Corinne Scheiner
> * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
> Corinne Scheiner
> Maytag Assistant Professor
> Comparative Literature
> The Colorado College
> 14 East Cache La Poudre Street
> Colorado Springs, CO 80903
> 719/389-6238 tel
> 719/389-6179 fax
> cscheiner@coloradocollege.edu
>
>