Subject
Re: Kubrick's LO. (fwd)
Date
Body
From: Rodney Welch <RWelch@scjob.sces.org>
Matt Morris believes that no "good Nabokovian" would dare
appreciate a film as low, base, vile, stupid, and utterly poshlustian
as Kubrick's LOLITA.
How strange, then, to discover that by Morris' standard, the very
worst Nabokovian is Nabokov himself. Let us examine what he said
following the film's premiere.
According to Brian Boyd, VN's expert biographer, VN said upon
seeing the film that "Kubrick was a great director, that his Lolita was a
first-rate film with magnificent actors, and that only ragged odds and
ends of my script had been used." Not only that, "There are even some
things in it I wish were in the book" -- such as the ping-pong game
between Humbert (James Mason) and Quilty (Peter Sellers).
Now, having said that, it bears noting that over time he seemed
to become somewhat ambivalent. "A lovely misty view seen through mosquito
netting," he called it, and "a scenic drive as perceived by the
horizontal pssenger of an ambulance." Something less than a rave,
perhaps, but hardly a put-down. (VN was not given to idle comments -- the
choice of the word "ambulance" may indicate the well-known feeling of
immobility and helplessness a writer feels when his beloved creation
becomes a Hollywood property. I say this at the risk of committing two
major Nabokovian transgressions -- Freudianism and human interest.
So sue me.)
Just what is a good Nabokovian anyway? To my mind, it is an
original and independent re-reader who adores the unique and has the
patience to discover it. I think it is someone with artistic sense --
someone who knows that creating art is not a matter of where you go or
who you know, but how well you understand (in all of its complexity)
where you are and what you have seen.
Anyone who wishes to understand more about the Nabokovian
aesthetic would do well, I think, to read the preface to The Picture of
Dorian Gray.
RW
Donald Barton Johnson wrote:
>
> From: ValSyl@aol.com
>
> As an amateur, I try to stay out of the fray, but certain remarks made by
> Matt Morris of Forsyth Technical Community College cry out for an attempt at
> a reasoned response.
>
> Diff'rent folks like diff'rent strokes. Lumping all of Kubrick's films into
> one trash can is an example of the kind of free-wheeling generalization which
> might, itself, strike some readers as _poshlost_. The extreme vitriol
> embodied in his dismissal of various Kubrick films reads at a very high
> pitch, almost a shriek. Are we to wipe all favorable impressions of these
> movies from our minds, and fall into lock-step behind Mr. Morris, who alone
> can lead us out of the woods? Sheesh ... I don't think that's what he wants,
> but it sure comes across that way.
>
> More disturbing, and sadder, is his attempt to gibe at Thomas Pynchon, and to
> somehow imply that "good Nabokovians" are -- what exactly? Ubermenschen und
> uberfrauen? (sorry, I don't know how to get the umlauts in email) Inherently
> superior, a predestined elite? This may come as a surprise to Mr. Morris,
> but I for one have found it possible to enjoy Pynchon and Nabokov, Rushdie,
> Byatt, Aksyonov, Robertson Davies, Joyce, Twain, Jose Donoso -- and those are
> just the first two shelves, I'm sure we all have our favorites. Perhaps it
> bears repeating: there has been more than one great novelist in history.
> One person's _poshlust_ is another's poesy.
>
> Mr. Morris' post was an unfair attack, shallow and shrill. If there were
> such a thing as a "good Nabokovian," he or she would not go around indulging
> in this pathetic and somewhat Kinbotian folly. GoshDARN that noisy amusement
> park! Place must be full of Pynchonites!
>
> Sylvia Weiser Wendel
--------End of Unsent Message
Matt Morris believes that no "good Nabokovian" would dare
appreciate a film as low, base, vile, stupid, and utterly poshlustian
as Kubrick's LOLITA.
How strange, then, to discover that by Morris' standard, the very
worst Nabokovian is Nabokov himself. Let us examine what he said
following the film's premiere.
According to Brian Boyd, VN's expert biographer, VN said upon
seeing the film that "Kubrick was a great director, that his Lolita was a
first-rate film with magnificent actors, and that only ragged odds and
ends of my script had been used." Not only that, "There are even some
things in it I wish were in the book" -- such as the ping-pong game
between Humbert (James Mason) and Quilty (Peter Sellers).
Now, having said that, it bears noting that over time he seemed
to become somewhat ambivalent. "A lovely misty view seen through mosquito
netting," he called it, and "a scenic drive as perceived by the
horizontal pssenger of an ambulance." Something less than a rave,
perhaps, but hardly a put-down. (VN was not given to idle comments -- the
choice of the word "ambulance" may indicate the well-known feeling of
immobility and helplessness a writer feels when his beloved creation
becomes a Hollywood property. I say this at the risk of committing two
major Nabokovian transgressions -- Freudianism and human interest.
So sue me.)
Just what is a good Nabokovian anyway? To my mind, it is an
original and independent re-reader who adores the unique and has the
patience to discover it. I think it is someone with artistic sense --
someone who knows that creating art is not a matter of where you go or
who you know, but how well you understand (in all of its complexity)
where you are and what you have seen.
Anyone who wishes to understand more about the Nabokovian
aesthetic would do well, I think, to read the preface to The Picture of
Dorian Gray.
RW
Donald Barton Johnson wrote:
>
> From: ValSyl@aol.com
>
> As an amateur, I try to stay out of the fray, but certain remarks made by
> Matt Morris of Forsyth Technical Community College cry out for an attempt at
> a reasoned response.
>
> Diff'rent folks like diff'rent strokes. Lumping all of Kubrick's films into
> one trash can is an example of the kind of free-wheeling generalization which
> might, itself, strike some readers as _poshlost_. The extreme vitriol
> embodied in his dismissal of various Kubrick films reads at a very high
> pitch, almost a shriek. Are we to wipe all favorable impressions of these
> movies from our minds, and fall into lock-step behind Mr. Morris, who alone
> can lead us out of the woods? Sheesh ... I don't think that's what he wants,
> but it sure comes across that way.
>
> More disturbing, and sadder, is his attempt to gibe at Thomas Pynchon, and to
> somehow imply that "good Nabokovians" are -- what exactly? Ubermenschen und
> uberfrauen? (sorry, I don't know how to get the umlauts in email) Inherently
> superior, a predestined elite? This may come as a surprise to Mr. Morris,
> but I for one have found it possible to enjoy Pynchon and Nabokov, Rushdie,
> Byatt, Aksyonov, Robertson Davies, Joyce, Twain, Jose Donoso -- and those are
> just the first two shelves, I'm sure we all have our favorites. Perhaps it
> bears repeating: there has been more than one great novelist in history.
> One person's _poshlust_ is another's poesy.
>
> Mr. Morris' post was an unfair attack, shallow and shrill. If there were
> such a thing as a "good Nabokovian," he or she would not go around indulging
> in this pathetic and somewhat Kinbotian folly. GoshDARN that noisy amusement
> park! Place must be full of Pynchonites!
>
> Sylvia Weiser Wendel
--------End of Unsent Message