David Herlihy, the foremost bicycle history expert, published a new note on Thomas Gaskell Allen, Jr. and William Lewis Sachtleben, the two “Gobi Desert cyclists” that appear in “The Gift”, with some previously unpublished photographs:

 

http://magazine.wustl.edu/2012/august/Pages/AlumniAllenandSachtleben.aspx

 

 

 

For more information, please see also:

 

Allen TG Jr, and Sachtleben WL, Across Asia on a Bicycle: The Journey of Two American Students from Constantinople to Peking. (2003 reprint available on Amazon).

Fet V., 2007. An additional source for a Central Asian episode in The Gift. The Nabokovian, 57: 31–37.

Zimmer, DE & Hartmann S: The Amazing Music of Truth: Nabokov's Sources for Godunov's Central Asian Travels in The Gift. Nabokov Studies, 7, 2002/2003: 33-74

Zimmer, DE. 2006. Nabokov reist im Traum in das Innere Asiens.

Fet V., Herlihy D. 2011. A Humber source of Humbert: more on Nabokov’s bicycles. The Nabokovian, 66: 15–21.

 

 

 

Victor Fet