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THOUGHTS: Birds and stone facades in RLSK
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Joseph Aisenberg writes:
"'Do you still lose your gloves, parcels?'." [ V had been present when SK and Clare saw a flock of smelly birds metamorphose into stone, wing and into a "fancily stylized" cold register:'Far too many pigeons,' she said, as we reached the kerb[...] The groan of a motor-lorry ...sent the birds wheeling across the sky[...]. They settled among the pearl-grey and black frieze of the Arc de Triomphe and when some of them fluttered off again it seemed as if bits of the carved entablature were turned into flaky life. A few years later I found that picture, 'that stone melting into wing', in Sebastian's third book.]
J.A.: I have had a similar vision in my own life, but a very American southwestern version. Over a decade ago, walking through the parking lot of one of the huge stand alone grocery stores that pockmark the city-life around here, a car near the store's facade drove past and several birds rose and scattered above. Because the asphalt was old and spotted with oil, it looked, for a moment, as if bits and of the parking lot had suddenly come to life. Point? Possibly Sebastian's image only seemed to coincide with V's. It's curious the way that the overlapping can seem almost as important as the charm and poetry of the image, which seems suspiciously susceptible to a symbolic reading about the nature of art.
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"'Do you still lose your gloves, parcels?'." [ V had been present when SK and Clare saw a flock of smelly birds metamorphose into stone, wing and into a "fancily stylized" cold register:'Far too many pigeons,' she said, as we reached the kerb[...] The groan of a motor-lorry ...sent the birds wheeling across the sky[...]. They settled among the pearl-grey and black frieze of the Arc de Triomphe and when some of them fluttered off again it seemed as if bits of the carved entablature were turned into flaky life. A few years later I found that picture, 'that stone melting into wing', in Sebastian's third book.]
J.A.: I have had a similar vision in my own life, but a very American southwestern version. Over a decade ago, walking through the parking lot of one of the huge stand alone grocery stores that pockmark the city-life around here, a car near the store's facade drove past and several birds rose and scattered above. Because the asphalt was old and spotted with oil, it looked, for a moment, as if bits and of the parking lot had suddenly come to life. Point? Possibly Sebastian's image only seemed to coincide with V's. It's curious the way that the overlapping can seem almost as important as the charm and poetry of the image, which seems suspiciously susceptible to a symbolic reading about the nature of art.
Search archive with Google:
http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=site:listserv.ucsb.edu&HL=en
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Visit "Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
Manage subscription options: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/