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Re: Nabokov on monism, symmetry, and doubles
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Dear Ed
My personal view re the meaning of N's claim to be an 'indivisible
monist is
as follows:an idealist is a monist, because he /she reduces reality to
the
one principle; a materialist is similarly a monist because he/she
reduces
reality to the one principle - but N was an 'indivisible monist'
because he
synthesised the ideal and the material - just as bergson asserted the
reality of both mind and matter and yet subsumed them within the one
principle (the elan vital). both N and B were indivisible monists in
this
sense, I think
best
mick glynn
many thanks to Don and to others who have helped re 'indivisible monist'
>> [EDNOTE. VN made that remark in a lengthy interview with Alfred
Appel
>> Jr. (for Contemporary Literature), p. 85 of the Vintage ed.
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My personal view re the meaning of N's claim to be an 'indivisible
monist is
as follows:an idealist is a monist, because he /she reduces reality to
the
one principle; a materialist is similarly a monist because he/she
reduces
reality to the one principle - but N was an 'indivisible monist'
because he
synthesised the ideal and the material - just as bergson asserted the
reality of both mind and matter and yet subsumed them within the one
principle (the elan vital). both N and B were indivisible monists in
this
sense, I think
best
mick glynn
many thanks to Don and to others who have helped re 'indivisible monist'
>> [EDNOTE. VN made that remark in a lengthy interview with Alfred
Appel
>> Jr. (for Contemporary Literature), p. 85 of the Vintage ed.
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