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Re: Mr and Mrs. Gutter Perchers and gutterings: a fourth pun
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Re: [NABOKV-L] Mr and Mrs. Gutter Perchers, acrobats and "Ch" sound in DARS K-B wrote: beside the play on 'percha/percher' we mustn't forget the TRIPLE PUN embedded in 'gutta/gutter.' ...as the chief constituent of the outer resilient plastic layer of GOLF BALLS... the obvious puns of golf balls 'perching' (dangling) on or near 'gutters'. GUTTER:From any kind of trough or groove, we also find gutters as the white space between two pages on a book - and as the ultimate social insult: "They were born in the gutter ... they speak gutter-English!!"
JM: Stan helped me find a TETRA PUN in VN, not simply a triple one.
The word "gutter" in Portuguese is "sarjeta" and it applies, like the French and the English perhaps, not only to the dirty-waters that run along the sidewalk where drunks trip and fall, but it also to a groovy trough or surgical incisions that cut channels in the skin for blood-letting. These are very similar to the guttings made in the Amazon rubber-trees extract the resin by letting the rubber-milk flow into little cups.
Stan added that "the original Malaysian seems to be 'getah-percha' which warns us against using the term 'correct' to any one of the many plausible transcriptions or pronunciations." And yet, if we should stop at the guttering word-plays with "Gutter-Perchers", the fourth pun ( describing the incisions on the rubber tree) comes out quite clearly! Still, the warning issued by Stan is fitting in another sense: the word "gutter", if linked to the French "gouttiere", must also be related to the French "goutte" (a drop). In Portuguese, the sound of "drops"("gotas") takes us to "esgoto" ( sewage, gutter), to "goteira" ( dripping roof-gutters), to "perdigoto" ( drops of saliva) but, apparently, not to "sarjeta" (an insulting "cradle" ), nor to the surgical or rubber-extractor's incisions!
Another word-play by VN in KQK is not as elegant. He wrote ( Chapter 3, page 769):
"Franz splurged: he purchased what the optician assured him was an American article. The rims were of tortoise shell - allowing no doubt for the well-known fact that chelonians are frequently and variously mocked".
I couldn't help imagining that the American article might not be a real "tortoise shell", but a resinous imitation ( would VN be considering the resulting English translation of his novel as a "mockery" of his original Russian?). But, perhaps, we should lay stress on a possible reference to Lewis Carroll's famous mock turtle soup. We know that "The Mock Turtle" is a fictional character in "Alice's adventures in Wonderland" (chapter 9):'Then the Queen left off, quite out of breath, and said to Alice, "Have you seen the Mock Turtle yet?"[ ...] "It's the thing Mock Turtle Soup is made from," said the Queen.' The Victorian dish called "mock turtle soup" was cooked from calf ( head,tail, hooves) to imitate turtle meat.
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JM: Stan helped me find a TETRA PUN in VN, not simply a triple one.
The word "gutter" in Portuguese is "sarjeta" and it applies, like the French and the English perhaps, not only to the dirty-waters that run along the sidewalk where drunks trip and fall, but it also to a groovy trough or surgical incisions that cut channels in the skin for blood-letting. These are very similar to the guttings made in the Amazon rubber-trees extract the resin by letting the rubber-milk flow into little cups.
Stan added that "the original Malaysian seems to be 'getah-percha' which warns us against using the term 'correct' to any one of the many plausible transcriptions or pronunciations." And yet, if we should stop at the guttering word-plays with "Gutter-Perchers", the fourth pun ( describing the incisions on the rubber tree) comes out quite clearly! Still, the warning issued by Stan is fitting in another sense: the word "gutter", if linked to the French "gouttiere", must also be related to the French "goutte" (a drop). In Portuguese, the sound of "drops"("gotas") takes us to "esgoto" ( sewage, gutter), to "goteira" ( dripping roof-gutters), to "perdigoto" ( drops of saliva) but, apparently, not to "sarjeta" (an insulting "cradle" ), nor to the surgical or rubber-extractor's incisions!
Another word-play by VN in KQK is not as elegant. He wrote ( Chapter 3, page 769):
"Franz splurged: he purchased what the optician assured him was an American article. The rims were of tortoise shell - allowing no doubt for the well-known fact that chelonians are frequently and variously mocked".
I couldn't help imagining that the American article might not be a real "tortoise shell", but a resinous imitation ( would VN be considering the resulting English translation of his novel as a "mockery" of his original Russian?). But, perhaps, we should lay stress on a possible reference to Lewis Carroll's famous mock turtle soup. We know that "The Mock Turtle" is a fictional character in "Alice's adventures in Wonderland" (chapter 9):'Then the Queen left off, quite out of breath, and said to Alice, "Have you seen the Mock Turtle yet?"[ ...] "It's the thing Mock Turtle Soup is made from," said the Queen.' The Victorian dish called "mock turtle soup" was cooked from calf ( head,tail, hooves) to imitate turtle meat.
Search the archive: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/archives/nabokv-l.html
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