-------- Original Message --------
> M Roth: John and Sybil "sent her, though, to a chateau
> in France" (line 336). The verb phrase here ("we sent her") seems
> a bit harsh, no?
J. Friedman: Maybe just concise? There's no room in the
meter for "we paid for her trip to a chateau in France."
> L Hochard: Yes it does! And there are other short unnoticed
> (as far as I
> know, and I must admit I don't know much, so I
> apologize if I'm merely
> repeating what everybody already knows) passages in the
> poem that do sound
> harsh toward Hazel, such as line 322 where Sybil
> says:" She wants to look
> a mess", quite a surprisingly violently derogatory
> phrase in a speech where
> she otherwise seems to defend Hazel and reproach John with
> "overstress(ing) the physical".
J. Friedman: Or consolation for herself and John--Hazel
is happy looking the way she is. (Sure.) But now that
you mention it, I agree that it can be read as blaming
Hazel.
> There's also this passage in Kinbote's note to line
> 230 (a domestic
>
> ghost): "Sybil had had the animal (Aunt Maud's
> half-paralized Skye terrier)
> destroyed soon after its mistress's hospitalization,
> incurring the wrath of
> Hazel who was beside herself with distress." The least
> we can say is that
> it was inconsiderate of her; she seems, at times, to be
> quite impervious
> to her child's distress. I would compare her attitude
> to Ada's toward Lucette.
J. Friedman: I find that point and comparison to /Ada/
interesting, though as you remark below, we have only
Kinbote's account.
> And of course there's the scene of THE HAUNTED BARN,
> (in Kinbote's
> note to line 347: old barn) where Sybil coldly makes fun of
> her daughter.
>
> I'm well aware that Kinbote reconstructed the scene and
> we know that he
> is not well-disposed toward Sybil; but this isn't the
> whole story since we
> have those hints in Shade's poem that cause the reader
> to feel half- consciously a budding uneasiness with regard
> to Sybil's and Hazel's
> relationship that Kinbote's commentary only reveals and
> emphazises.
>
> The mention of "those / almost unruffled evenings", a few
> lines after "She'd criticize / Ferociously our
> projects" also seem to hint at a
> not entirely harmonious family atmosphere.
J. Friedman: More than hint, I'd say.
> And Finally, the very title of the film (Remorse) Sybil
> selects on
> the night of Hazel's suicide can't have been chosen
> at random; VN means, I
> think, that someone is feeling remorse for what is about to
> take place.
J. Friedman: Or getting a preview of it.
As I've said before, maybe Shade's remorse comes from his
(and Sybil's) irrational and plausibly destructive attitude
toward Hazel's looks. There's no reason to expect that an
unattractive girl will never experience love or sex (Carolyn
Kunin has discussed that here too), or even if there were
true, there's no reason to expect that every other
consideration is "no use".
...
> But I must wait till I've read BB's "The
> Magic of Artistic Discovery" (I've just ordered
> it) before I can really make up my mind.
J. Friedman: It's an amazing book.
...
> LH: It seems to me that if there was an actual incestuous
> relation between
> Hazel and her father, there would be some hint,however
> tenuous, in the poem
> as well as in the commentary; as there is, for instance, in
> LATH, so that
> the reader may know even if the narrator denies it. The
> incestuous relation
> you're talking about seems to be more on a symbolical
> plane (the literary
> incest between text and commentary) than a (fictive)
> "reality".
J. Friedman: In particular, Shade seems to feel responsible
for Hazel's death (perhaps rightly), and in myths and other
sources killing one's children is linked to incest with them
as Matt has noted, but I agree with you in /Pale Fire/ that's
probably restricted to association rather than "real" events.
Jerry Friedman