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Fwd: MosNews.com article -- unpublished novel of Vladimir Nabokov
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----- Forwarded message from spklein52@hotmail.com -----
Date: Thu, 24 Nov 2005 11:09:34 -0500
From: "Sandy P. Klein" <spklein52@hotmail.com>
Reply-To: SPKlein52@HotMail.com
Subject: MosNews.com article -- unpublished novel of Vladimir Nabokov ...
To: SPKlein52@HotMail.com
[1]
Nabokovs Son to Destroy Writers Last Novel Unread Paper
MOSNEWS, Russia - 3 hours ago
http://www.mosnews.com/news/2005/11/24/nabokovnovel.shtml[2]
Vladimir Nabokov and his son Dmitri / Photo from www.br-online.de
-------------------------
NABOKOVS SON TO DESTROY WRITERS LAST NOVEL UNREAD PAPER
Created: 24.11.2005 14:54 MSK (GMT +3), Updated: 16:15 MSK, 2 HOURS
45 MINUTES AGO
MosNews
The last, unpublished novel of Vladimir Nabokov, the author of
Lolita, is to be destroyed without scholars or the public having a
chance to read it, the writers son told The Times.
Dmitri Nabokov once said that the unfinished book, The Original of
Laura, would have been Fathers most brilliant novel, the most
concentrated distillation of his creativity.
But the celebrated Russian emigrant left instructions that the
manuscript be destroyed on his death in 1977. His wife, Vera, could
not bring herself to fulfill her husbands wish and bequeathed the
decision to their son when she died in 1991.
Dmitri Nabokov, 71, an opera singer, had considered placing the
manuscript in the trust of a university, museum or foundation to
allow limited access for scholars. But in an e-mail to Ron Rosenbaum,
a literary columnist for the New York Observer, he now says he plans
to destroy the book before his death.
Little is known about The Original of Laura beyond that, as revealed
by the family, it is revolutionary in form and about a real Laura
and a non-real Laura. One of the working titles that Nabokov is said
to have used for the book was Dying is Fun.
The Washington Post reported in 1989 that The Original of Laura was
to have been a short novel, with between a third and a half already
in final form.
Some accounts say the manuscript comprises 30 to 40 pages, possibly
made up of the index cards that Nabokov used to write his first
drafts.
Possibly the only written reference by the author was in a letter
eight months before his death. He wrote: The Original of Laura, the
not quite finished manuscript of a novel which I had begun writing
and reworking before my illness and which was completed in my mind: I
must have gone through it some 50 times and in my diurnal delirium
kept reading it aloud to a small dream audience in a walled garden.
My audience consisted of peacocks, pigeons, my long-dead parents, two
cypresses, several young nurses crouching around, and a family doctor
so old as to be almost invisible.
Links:
------
[1] http://www.mosnews.com/
[2] http://www.mosnews.com/news/2005/11/24/nabokovnovel.shtml
----- End forwarded message -----
Date: Thu, 24 Nov 2005 11:09:34 -0500
From: "Sandy P. Klein" <spklein52@hotmail.com>
Reply-To: SPKlein52@HotMail.com
Subject: MosNews.com article -- unpublished novel of Vladimir Nabokov ...
To: SPKlein52@HotMail.com
[1]
Nabokovs Son to Destroy Writers Last Novel Unread Paper
MOSNEWS, Russia - 3 hours ago
http://www.mosnews.com/news/2005/11/24/nabokovnovel.shtml[2]
Vladimir Nabokov and his son Dmitri / Photo from www.br-online.de
-------------------------
NABOKOVS SON TO DESTROY WRITERS LAST NOVEL UNREAD PAPER
Created: 24.11.2005 14:54 MSK (GMT +3), Updated: 16:15 MSK, 2 HOURS
45 MINUTES AGO
MosNews
The last, unpublished novel of Vladimir Nabokov, the author of
Lolita, is to be destroyed without scholars or the public having a
chance to read it, the writers son told The Times.
Dmitri Nabokov once said that the unfinished book, The Original of
Laura, would have been Fathers most brilliant novel, the most
concentrated distillation of his creativity.
But the celebrated Russian emigrant left instructions that the
manuscript be destroyed on his death in 1977. His wife, Vera, could
not bring herself to fulfill her husbands wish and bequeathed the
decision to their son when she died in 1991.
Dmitri Nabokov, 71, an opera singer, had considered placing the
manuscript in the trust of a university, museum or foundation to
allow limited access for scholars. But in an e-mail to Ron Rosenbaum,
a literary columnist for the New York Observer, he now says he plans
to destroy the book before his death.
Little is known about The Original of Laura beyond that, as revealed
by the family, it is revolutionary in form and about a real Laura
and a non-real Laura. One of the working titles that Nabokov is said
to have used for the book was Dying is Fun.
The Washington Post reported in 1989 that The Original of Laura was
to have been a short novel, with between a third and a half already
in final form.
Some accounts say the manuscript comprises 30 to 40 pages, possibly
made up of the index cards that Nabokov used to write his first
drafts.
Possibly the only written reference by the author was in a letter
eight months before his death. He wrote: The Original of Laura, the
not quite finished manuscript of a novel which I had begun writing
and reworking before my illness and which was completed in my mind: I
must have gone through it some 50 times and in my diurnal delirium
kept reading it aloud to a small dream audience in a walled garden.
My audience consisted of peacocks, pigeons, my long-dead parents, two
cypresses, several young nurses crouching around, and a family doctor
so old as to be almost invisible.
Links:
------
[1] http://www.mosnews.com/
[2] http://www.mosnews.com/news/2005/11/24/nabokovnovel.shtml
----- End forwarded message -----