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THOUGHTS: Kim Beauharnais in ADA and other Kims
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Once we started on kimology(leaving out female Kim[berley]s], let's recall that:
(a) Kipling's "Kim" (a nickname; boy's full name was Kimball O'Hara) promotes the concept of Great Game of influence between England and Russia spheres, quite an Antiterran geoconcept if one looks closer (see Alexei's treatise on Scots/Scandinavians);
(b) In 1950 movie "Kim", the main adult role of Makhbub Ali was played by Erroll Flynn who, by the way, only two years before that was Don Juan in "Adventures of Don Juan" (and I will NOT expand on Don Juan here);
(c) Kim (nothing to do with Kipling) was a popular male acronymic name in 1920s Russia, deciphered as (I AM NOT KIDDING) Kommunisticheskij Internatsional Molodezhi (The Communist Youth Internatonal, a section of Comintern in 1919-1943). One of the Communist youth's desired features is, of course, spying and informing (see classical Pavlik Morozov story of 1930s); in this sense Kim B. is a Soviet 'young pioneer' in "Ada"'s Amerussian world.
(d) another Kim (nothing to do with Kipling) is of course a common Korean surname (it means "gold", like in "d'or", but I am not expanding on d'or), and a Kim was already a North Korean dictator when "Ada" was written (a "Khan Soso" type), and still is; spying and informing is a child's first duty in this society as well as in Khan Soso's;
(e) finally (and everything to do with Kipling!), Kim is an obvious reverse of Mik, the famous heroic African boy of Nikolai Gumilev's long poem "Mik" (1914).
Victor Fet
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(a) Kipling's "Kim" (a nickname; boy's full name was Kimball O'Hara) promotes the concept of Great Game of influence between England and Russia spheres, quite an Antiterran geoconcept if one looks closer (see Alexei's treatise on Scots/Scandinavians);
(b) In 1950 movie "Kim", the main adult role of Makhbub Ali was played by Erroll Flynn who, by the way, only two years before that was Don Juan in "Adventures of Don Juan" (and I will NOT expand on Don Juan here);
(c) Kim (nothing to do with Kipling) was a popular male acronymic name in 1920s Russia, deciphered as (I AM NOT KIDDING) Kommunisticheskij Internatsional Molodezhi (The Communist Youth Internatonal, a section of Comintern in 1919-1943). One of the Communist youth's desired features is, of course, spying and informing (see classical Pavlik Morozov story of 1930s); in this sense Kim B. is a Soviet 'young pioneer' in "Ada"'s Amerussian world.
(d) another Kim (nothing to do with Kipling) is of course a common Korean surname (it means "gold", like in "d'or", but I am not expanding on d'or), and a Kim was already a North Korean dictator when "Ada" was written (a "Khan Soso" type), and still is; spying and informing is a child's first duty in this society as well as in Khan Soso's;
(e) finally (and everything to do with Kipling!), Kim is an obvious reverse of Mik, the famous heroic African boy of Nikolai Gumilev's long poem "Mik" (1914).
Victor Fet
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/