Subject
Cedars and waxwings in PALE FIRE (fwd)
Date
Body
From: esampson@cu.campus.mci.net (Earl Sampson)
I forward another item from the Usenet newsgroup alt.books.nabokov: Jerry
Friedman comments on PALE FIRE.
>
> Thank you, Mark Dintenfass and Earl Sampson, for the encouragement!
>Of the natural-history notes I promised you or threatened you with,
>the following has the most to do with enjoying a Nabokov novel (and so
>is the most likely to be old news). I've tried to keep the biological
>details in footnotes.
> Every reader of _Pale Fire_ knows the first line of John Shade's
>poem: "I was the shadow of the waxwing slain". That waxwing must have
>been a cedar waxwing, _Bombycilla cedrorum_, a fairly common small bird
>in most of North America, to whose beauty Kinbote's admiring
>description does not do justice. Thus the first line contains an
>unspoken "cedar", which echoes "Cedarn, Utana", subscript to the
>Foreword. Here at the beginning of the main part of _Pale Fire_, I'm
>reminded of an ornamental entrance between two cedar trees.
> Kinbote underlines this parallel in his note to the first four
>lines. He mentions having seen waxwings feeding on the berries of
>Shade's junipers--and indeed these berry-loving birds get their name,
>and their nickname of "cedarbird", from this habit. Although junipers
>are not the true cedars of the Old World [2], they are the trees most
>Americans call cedars (including Shade, as we'll see). In fact, in
>note 93 to his translation of Lermontov's _A Hero of Our Time_, Nabokov
>mentions "juniper (or as we say in America, 'cedar')" [2]. Three
>cedar trees are growing in parallel (though in hiding) here: at the
>end of the Forword, in the first line of the poem, and in the first
>note of the Commentary.
> Thus we might look for more cedars. They reappear at (or almost
>at) another crucial point of the structure--almost at the end of Canto
>2, in the most emotionally intense part of the poem. The policemen
>bringing the Shades the news of their daughter's death are heralded by
>their cars' lights on "five cedar trunks" (line 485). Presumably these
>are the same junipers mentioned earlier. As a good natural historian,
>Shade must know the difference between junipers and true cedars, but
>"as a good American" (note to lines 367-370), he calls them cedars
>(especially, perhaps, when it fits the meter).
> Having seen these cedars at the beginning, we might look for them
>at the end. And there they are--not at the end, but near it. In the
>note to line 998, Kinbote digresses to finally describe Wordsmith
>College's famous avenue lined with every tree mentioned in Shakespeare.
>He includes "a cedar (_Cedrus_)". Then in the next and last note,
>describing how he leads Shade over to celebrate finishing the poem, he
>mentions the junipers literally in passing. But these cedars are not
>quite at the end--perhaps to avoid creating a pat symmetry or giving
>them excessive importance. The non-human living things I associate
>with the end of the book are the laurels to which Shade and Kinbote
>retreat from Gradus alias Jack Grey in the note to line 1000. And that
>image and that of the Red Admirable [3] recede to leave room for the
>end of the Pretender's story, the dissolution of his pretenses, and his
>expectation of death.
> But getting back to the live Kinbote, I mentioned earlier that two
>of the cedars at the beginning are hidden. I wonder whether they were
>hidden from Kinbote. The irony of his including this correspondence in
>his narration unknowingly would be typical, like his not getting the
>mention of the lemniscate (lines 138-9 and the note). On the other
>hand, he presumably gives the Latin name of the cedar for the same
>reason that he gives the Latin name of the sycamore--because Americans
>and Britons use those names for different trees [4]. Making so little
>display of his knowledge strikes me as out of Kinbote's character.
>(Compare his indignation in the note to lines 1-4 about that impostor,
>the American robin.) Perhaps Nabokov had him help American readers
>by providing those two scientific names for reasons of Kinbote's own.
>Or perhaps I don't understand his character as well as I think.
> Finally the waxwings. I regret to inform the reader that
>_Bombycilla shadei_ (note to line 71) does not exist. The world has
>only three species of waxwings [5], and since waxwings are common, bold
>birds of the North Temperate Zone, the possibility that a species could
>have remained undiscovered, even in Shade's father's time, would have
>been very remote.
> The Latin name _Bombycilla_ comes from "bombyx", silkworm or
>silkworm moth. The "cilla" part could mean "tail", I think, but I'm
>only inferring that from scientific names of birds (such as
>_Haliaeetus albicilla_, the white-tailed eagle). Or maybe "bombycilla"
>is just a diminutive of "bombyx" that _looks_ as if it means "silktail".
>Either way the name of Charles the Beloved's waxwing-like "sampel",
>meaning "silktail", does not seem to be a coincidence (note to lines
>1-4).
> Kinbote was sufficiently rushed, frantic, or unwilling to belabor
>the obvious, that he didn't spell out the connection between
>_Bombycilla shadei_ and "I was the shadow of the waxwing slain". And
>so am I.
>
>
> [1] The three species are named for their highland habitats: the
>Atlas or Atlantic cedar (_Cedrus atlantica_), the cedar of Lebanon
>(_Cedrus libani_, also found in Syria and Turkey--the Cyprus cedar is
>considered conspecific by some authorities and a separate species by
>others), and the Himalayan cedar (_Cedrus deodara_, also called the
>deodar). They have short needles like junipers', but their long
>branches make them much more imposingly dome-like or spreading than
>most conifers.
> The majestic beauty of cedar trees has led to not only many
>mentions in the Hebrew Bible, but also the name "deodar"--from Sanskrit
>"devadaru", meaning divine tree. ("Daru" is ultimately related to
>"tree", "dryad", and probably "druid".)
> Cedar wood is fragrant, but the fragrant wood called "cedar" in
>America comes from certain American species of _Juniperus_.
>
> [2] This statement is overly sweeping, but knowing every American
>dialect would be too much to expect of Nabokov. When I came to
>northern New Mexico, I learned that people here refer to the shrubby
>and scrubby junipers as junipers; only the tall Rocky Mountain juniper
>(_Juniperus scopulorum_) is called "cedar".
>
> [3] Sic. Does anyone know what evidence Nabokov had that "red
>admiral" comes from "red admirable"?
>
> [4] Shakespeare presumably used "sycamore" to refer to a European
>maple, _Acer pseudoplatanus_, which is naturalized in Britain. As the
>name implies, it's similar to the trees of the genus _Platanus_, which
>in America are called sycamores and in Britain, plane trees.
> Kinbote could also have glossed "lime"--it's not the citrus but
>the linden or (in America) basswood, _Tilia_.
>
> [5] The cedar waxwing, which breeds in the ten Canadian provinces
>and the northern U.S., farther south in the Applachians; the Bohemian
>waxwing (_Bombycilla garrulus_, known in Britain simply as the waxwing),
>which breeds in Arctic and cold temperate areas from Scandinavia east
>through Siberia and Alaska to the northwestern U.S.; and the Japanese
>waxwing (_Bombycilla japonica_), which breeds mostly in eastern Siberia.
>Outside the breeding season, all three species wander widely in flocks,
>from which gypsying the Bohemian waxwing gets its American name.
> Its wanderings can take it to the Atlantic coast of Canada and
>nearly to the Mexican border--but apparently not as far southeast as
>the southern Appalachians. For that reason I concluded that the
>waxwings in Shade's garden were cedar waxwings, which occur year-round
>in Appalachia.
> Jerry Friedman
>
>-----== Posted via Deja News, The Leader in Internet Discussion ==-----
>http://www.dejanews.com/ Now offering spam-free web-based newsreading
I forward another item from the Usenet newsgroup alt.books.nabokov: Jerry
Friedman comments on PALE FIRE.
>
> Thank you, Mark Dintenfass and Earl Sampson, for the encouragement!
>Of the natural-history notes I promised you or threatened you with,
>the following has the most to do with enjoying a Nabokov novel (and so
>is the most likely to be old news). I've tried to keep the biological
>details in footnotes.
> Every reader of _Pale Fire_ knows the first line of John Shade's
>poem: "I was the shadow of the waxwing slain". That waxwing must have
>been a cedar waxwing, _Bombycilla cedrorum_, a fairly common small bird
>in most of North America, to whose beauty Kinbote's admiring
>description does not do justice. Thus the first line contains an
>unspoken "cedar", which echoes "Cedarn, Utana", subscript to the
>Foreword. Here at the beginning of the main part of _Pale Fire_, I'm
>reminded of an ornamental entrance between two cedar trees.
> Kinbote underlines this parallel in his note to the first four
>lines. He mentions having seen waxwings feeding on the berries of
>Shade's junipers--and indeed these berry-loving birds get their name,
>and their nickname of "cedarbird", from this habit. Although junipers
>are not the true cedars of the Old World [2], they are the trees most
>Americans call cedars (including Shade, as we'll see). In fact, in
>note 93 to his translation of Lermontov's _A Hero of Our Time_, Nabokov
>mentions "juniper (or as we say in America, 'cedar')" [2]. Three
>cedar trees are growing in parallel (though in hiding) here: at the
>end of the Forword, in the first line of the poem, and in the first
>note of the Commentary.
> Thus we might look for more cedars. They reappear at (or almost
>at) another crucial point of the structure--almost at the end of Canto
>2, in the most emotionally intense part of the poem. The policemen
>bringing the Shades the news of their daughter's death are heralded by
>their cars' lights on "five cedar trunks" (line 485). Presumably these
>are the same junipers mentioned earlier. As a good natural historian,
>Shade must know the difference between junipers and true cedars, but
>"as a good American" (note to lines 367-370), he calls them cedars
>(especially, perhaps, when it fits the meter).
> Having seen these cedars at the beginning, we might look for them
>at the end. And there they are--not at the end, but near it. In the
>note to line 998, Kinbote digresses to finally describe Wordsmith
>College's famous avenue lined with every tree mentioned in Shakespeare.
>He includes "a cedar (_Cedrus_)". Then in the next and last note,
>describing how he leads Shade over to celebrate finishing the poem, he
>mentions the junipers literally in passing. But these cedars are not
>quite at the end--perhaps to avoid creating a pat symmetry or giving
>them excessive importance. The non-human living things I associate
>with the end of the book are the laurels to which Shade and Kinbote
>retreat from Gradus alias Jack Grey in the note to line 1000. And that
>image and that of the Red Admirable [3] recede to leave room for the
>end of the Pretender's story, the dissolution of his pretenses, and his
>expectation of death.
> But getting back to the live Kinbote, I mentioned earlier that two
>of the cedars at the beginning are hidden. I wonder whether they were
>hidden from Kinbote. The irony of his including this correspondence in
>his narration unknowingly would be typical, like his not getting the
>mention of the lemniscate (lines 138-9 and the note). On the other
>hand, he presumably gives the Latin name of the cedar for the same
>reason that he gives the Latin name of the sycamore--because Americans
>and Britons use those names for different trees [4]. Making so little
>display of his knowledge strikes me as out of Kinbote's character.
>(Compare his indignation in the note to lines 1-4 about that impostor,
>the American robin.) Perhaps Nabokov had him help American readers
>by providing those two scientific names for reasons of Kinbote's own.
>Or perhaps I don't understand his character as well as I think.
> Finally the waxwings. I regret to inform the reader that
>_Bombycilla shadei_ (note to line 71) does not exist. The world has
>only three species of waxwings [5], and since waxwings are common, bold
>birds of the North Temperate Zone, the possibility that a species could
>have remained undiscovered, even in Shade's father's time, would have
>been very remote.
> The Latin name _Bombycilla_ comes from "bombyx", silkworm or
>silkworm moth. The "cilla" part could mean "tail", I think, but I'm
>only inferring that from scientific names of birds (such as
>_Haliaeetus albicilla_, the white-tailed eagle). Or maybe "bombycilla"
>is just a diminutive of "bombyx" that _looks_ as if it means "silktail".
>Either way the name of Charles the Beloved's waxwing-like "sampel",
>meaning "silktail", does not seem to be a coincidence (note to lines
>1-4).
> Kinbote was sufficiently rushed, frantic, or unwilling to belabor
>the obvious, that he didn't spell out the connection between
>_Bombycilla shadei_ and "I was the shadow of the waxwing slain". And
>so am I.
>
>
> [1] The three species are named for their highland habitats: the
>Atlas or Atlantic cedar (_Cedrus atlantica_), the cedar of Lebanon
>(_Cedrus libani_, also found in Syria and Turkey--the Cyprus cedar is
>considered conspecific by some authorities and a separate species by
>others), and the Himalayan cedar (_Cedrus deodara_, also called the
>deodar). They have short needles like junipers', but their long
>branches make them much more imposingly dome-like or spreading than
>most conifers.
> The majestic beauty of cedar trees has led to not only many
>mentions in the Hebrew Bible, but also the name "deodar"--from Sanskrit
>"devadaru", meaning divine tree. ("Daru" is ultimately related to
>"tree", "dryad", and probably "druid".)
> Cedar wood is fragrant, but the fragrant wood called "cedar" in
>America comes from certain American species of _Juniperus_.
>
> [2] This statement is overly sweeping, but knowing every American
>dialect would be too much to expect of Nabokov. When I came to
>northern New Mexico, I learned that people here refer to the shrubby
>and scrubby junipers as junipers; only the tall Rocky Mountain juniper
>(_Juniperus scopulorum_) is called "cedar".
>
> [3] Sic. Does anyone know what evidence Nabokov had that "red
>admiral" comes from "red admirable"?
>
> [4] Shakespeare presumably used "sycamore" to refer to a European
>maple, _Acer pseudoplatanus_, which is naturalized in Britain. As the
>name implies, it's similar to the trees of the genus _Platanus_, which
>in America are called sycamores and in Britain, plane trees.
> Kinbote could also have glossed "lime"--it's not the citrus but
>the linden or (in America) basswood, _Tilia_.
>
> [5] The cedar waxwing, which breeds in the ten Canadian provinces
>and the northern U.S., farther south in the Applachians; the Bohemian
>waxwing (_Bombycilla garrulus_, known in Britain simply as the waxwing),
>which breeds in Arctic and cold temperate areas from Scandinavia east
>through Siberia and Alaska to the northwestern U.S.; and the Japanese
>waxwing (_Bombycilla japonica_), which breeds mostly in eastern Siberia.
>Outside the breeding season, all three species wander widely in flocks,
>from which gypsying the Bohemian waxwing gets its American name.
> Its wanderings can take it to the Atlantic coast of Canada and
>nearly to the Mexican border--but apparently not as far southeast as
>the southern Appalachians. For that reason I concluded that the
>waxwings in Shade's garden were cedar waxwings, which occur year-round
>in Appalachia.
> Jerry Friedman
>
>-----== Posted via Deja News, The Leader in Internet Discussion ==-----
>http://www.dejanews.com/ Now offering spam-free web-based newsreading