Subject
Help with otherworldly logic
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Date
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To the List,
I just ran across the often quoted statement VN made regarding his
belief in a transcendent reality
"I know more than I can express in words, and the little I can express
would not have been expressed, had I not known more."
There seems to be something the matter with this sentence. There seems
to be some break down in grammatical or logical thought. Or else I
simply don't understand.
Could someone re-state this sentence in other words so that I can
understand it? It's the second "not" that throws me. Does he know more,
or doesn't he? If he had not known more, would he have expressed it or
not?
I tried changing the order to
"Had I not known more than I can express in words, the little I can
express would not have been expressed."
This seems marginally more comprehensible, but I'm still baffled. Is he
saying that if he knew less than he does he would have expressed it?
Help!
thanks,
Carolyn
[EDNOTE. I think you understand it correctly, Carolyn. VN claims that
he does know more than he has said, but that he is only able to
articulate part of his knowledge. It is because he does know more,
however, that he can say what little he has said. -- SES]
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I just ran across the often quoted statement VN made regarding his
belief in a transcendent reality
"I know more than I can express in words, and the little I can express
would not have been expressed, had I not known more."
There seems to be something the matter with this sentence. There seems
to be some break down in grammatical or logical thought. Or else I
simply don't understand.
Could someone re-state this sentence in other words so that I can
understand it? It's the second "not" that throws me. Does he know more,
or doesn't he? If he had not known more, would he have expressed it or
not?
I tried changing the order to
"Had I not known more than I can express in words, the little I can
express would not have been expressed."
This seems marginally more comprehensible, but I'm still baffled. Is he
saying that if he knew less than he does he would have expressed it?
Help!
thanks,
Carolyn
[EDNOTE. I think you understand it correctly, Carolyn. VN claims that
he does know more than he has said, but that he is only able to
articulate part of his knowledge. It is because he does know more,
however, that he can say what little he has said. -- SES]
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