Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0005621, Thu, 14 Dec 2000 13:08:06 -0800

Subject
Fw QUOTE QUERY?
Date
Body
EDITOR's COMMENT. CAn any one identify this approximately rendered quote.
It is apparently rendered from the Russian (?) into English, so it may well
vary substantially from it original formulation?

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sun, 03 Dec 2000 07:07:25 +0000
From: Celia Hawkesworth <c.hawkesworth@ssees.ac.uk>

Could you help me out with a translation I'm working on, please? It contains
a reference to a Nabokov quote something along the following lines -

In the "empire of the trivial" wrote Vladimir Nabokov, "it is not the book
that brings success, but the reading public."

I've used 'the trivial' as a rendering of poshlost'. I am assuming that this
is quite a well-known quotation? If so, can you advise on appropriate
wording? Very many thanks.

Celia