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A syllogism and more from SO...
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While ordering the commentaries I inadvertently used the initials RG instead of RT to reproduce Rachel Trousdale's sentence [ Shade reads everything to Sybil, and Sybil translates poetry from English to French. Wouldn't she make sure his "Baudelaire" was pronounced correctly?]. Please, excuse me Rachel.
AS: Has anyone pointed out the obvious logical fallacy in this "syllogism"? One can deduce from "Other men die" and "I'll not die" that "I am not another", but not the other way round.
JM: This fallacy is delliberately used by Shade and Duchamp. Before them, it was used by Toltstoy in "Death of Ivan Ilych", as Sergey Karpukhin described. The distortion is revealing!
Returning to the " Poor old man Swift, poor --, poor Baudelaire" discussion:
VN wrote in Strong Opinions: "I think it is so nice that the day on which Kinbote committed suicide ( and he certainly did after putting the last touches to his edition of the poem) happens to be both the anniversary of Pushkin's Lyceum and that of "poor old man Swift" 's death, which is new to me ( but see variant in note to line 231). In common with Pushkin, I am fascinated by fatidic dates" (Vintage, pages 74/75)
Kinbote noted:Among the names of celebrated poets, painters, philosophers, etc., known to have become insane or to have sunk into senile imbecility, we find many suitable ones... Dark, disturbing thoughts. We can be certain Kinbote considered the omitted name to be his and this means he perceived he was insane, as already pointed out, but it also shows that he hoped he'd have his sanity re-established in the Strange Other World, unless he should suffer a re-incarnation*.
Kinbote died in October 19. Why is it linked to "fatidic events"?
I tried to find other important birthdays and events for October 19,1959. In the Religious calendar it is the day when Ivan Ilyich Sergiyev ( Иван Ильич Сергиев) was born. He was later canonized by the Russian Orthodox Churches and has the second largest monastery of St. Petersburg dedicated to him as St. John of Kronstadt.
Unfortunately I couldn't handle the search for old New York Times editions to try and find as interesting information in it as we got in PF, after joining the narrator and read over Gradus' shoulders.
* - Isn't the potato a "tuber"?
line 502: The grand potato....I.P.H, a lay...;
line 559: How to keep sane in spiral types of space
lines 618/19: Maybe one finds le grand néant; maybe/ Again one spirals from the tuber's eye.
CK's comments on line 619[ The pun sprouts ( see line 502) ] seems to indicate that, but I still cannot see what has "sprouted". Any ideas? Sprouting goggle-eyed potatoes are scarcely desirable?
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AS: Has anyone pointed out the obvious logical fallacy in this "syllogism"? One can deduce from "Other men die" and "I'll not die" that "I am not another", but not the other way round.
JM: This fallacy is delliberately used by Shade and Duchamp. Before them, it was used by Toltstoy in "Death of Ivan Ilych", as Sergey Karpukhin described. The distortion is revealing!
Returning to the " Poor old man Swift, poor --, poor Baudelaire" discussion:
VN wrote in Strong Opinions: "I think it is so nice that the day on which Kinbote committed suicide ( and he certainly did after putting the last touches to his edition of the poem) happens to be both the anniversary of Pushkin's Lyceum and that of "poor old man Swift" 's death, which is new to me ( but see variant in note to line 231). In common with Pushkin, I am fascinated by fatidic dates" (Vintage, pages 74/75)
Kinbote noted:Among the names of celebrated poets, painters, philosophers, etc., known to have become insane or to have sunk into senile imbecility, we find many suitable ones... Dark, disturbing thoughts. We can be certain Kinbote considered the omitted name to be his and this means he perceived he was insane, as already pointed out, but it also shows that he hoped he'd have his sanity re-established in the Strange Other World, unless he should suffer a re-incarnation*.
Kinbote died in October 19. Why is it linked to "fatidic events"?
I tried to find other important birthdays and events for October 19,1959. In the Religious calendar it is the day when Ivan Ilyich Sergiyev ( Иван Ильич Сергиев) was born. He was later canonized by the Russian Orthodox Churches and has the second largest monastery of St. Petersburg dedicated to him as St. John of Kronstadt.
Unfortunately I couldn't handle the search for old New York Times editions to try and find as interesting information in it as we got in PF, after joining the narrator and read over Gradus' shoulders.
* - Isn't the potato a "tuber"?
line 502: The grand potato....I.P.H, a lay...;
line 559: How to keep sane in spiral types of space
lines 618/19: Maybe one finds le grand néant; maybe/ Again one spirals from the tuber's eye.
CK's comments on line 619[ The pun sprouts ( see line 502) ] seems to indicate that, but I still cannot see what has "sprouted". Any ideas? Sprouting goggle-eyed potatoes are scarcely desirable?
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