Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0004418, Mon, 27 Sep 1999 09:33:50 -0700

Subject
VN, The Paris Review, and E.M. Forster
Date
Body
From: Galya Diment <galya@u.washington.edu>
From: Galya Diment <galya@u.washington.edu>

Today's NYT has an article on the Pierpont Morgan Library's acquisition of
The Paris Review archives. There is a nice picture of VN with reading
glasses on the tip of his nose leaning out of the passenger seat window of
a car. The paragraph about him reads:
**
An answer in one interview might provoke a question in another, as in this
one to Nabokov" "E.M. Forster says his characters sometimes take over and
dictate the course of his novels. Has this ever been a problem for you, or
are you in complete command?" Nabokov said haughtily, "My knowledge of Mr.
Forster's work is limited to one novel which I dislike," and in contrast,
"My characters are galley slaves."
**

I happen to think that some of his characters could be controlled less than
others -- Pnin, for example, who, I think, at some point, did take over --
and what a good thing too!

I quite forgot that E. M. Forster was yet another writer whom VN said he
actively "disliked." I wonder which novel he read -- probably _A Passage
to India_, and found it too "regional." He probably would have not liked
him any better had he read _Howards End_ or _A Room with a View_ --
but I have a soft spot for Forster, especially _Howards End_, so I may
wish he had given him another chance. Forster as an enthusiast of
Russian literature who had a painful love-hate relationship with Tolstoy
(as he was dying, he apparently asked a friend to read "The Death of Ivan
Ilyich" to him) might have appealed to him too. But, I guess, the "only
connect..." just didn't happen in the case of these two.

Galya Diment