Subject
Re: Fwd: Re: three Nabokovian blunders in Ada
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Date
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Carolyn
I hardly think that drawing attention to Nabokov's strategy of inserting
deliberate 'Freudian slips' or 'blunders' into his writings warrants a
charge of 'intellectual dishonesty.' The 'plain' blunders Nabokov inserted
into his memoirs and his translation of Eugene Onegin can hardly be
accidental. Especially given that Nabokov specifically requested during one
interview that his biographer attend to the 'plain' facts and truths about
his life. Unlike yourself (or so it seems) I do not interpret
VN's 'blunders' or games around gender as merely frivolous. I believe he
has an ulterior purpose for playing these games. Why do you think Nabokov
stressed on (at least four occasions that I can count) that he shared a
birth date with the gender-bending playwright William Shakespeare? Why did
Nabokov so thoroughly raise the possibility of a Shakespearean conspiracy
within Bend Sinister? Why did he lie in his postscript "On a Book Entitled
Lolita" and state that a US publisher had once suggested to him that he
replace his 12 year old female nymphet with a boy?
Jo Morgan
Sydney
----- End forwarded message -----
I hardly think that drawing attention to Nabokov's strategy of inserting
deliberate 'Freudian slips' or 'blunders' into his writings warrants a
charge of 'intellectual dishonesty.' The 'plain' blunders Nabokov inserted
into his memoirs and his translation of Eugene Onegin can hardly be
accidental. Especially given that Nabokov specifically requested during one
interview that his biographer attend to the 'plain' facts and truths about
his life. Unlike yourself (or so it seems) I do not interpret
VN's 'blunders' or games around gender as merely frivolous. I believe he
has an ulterior purpose for playing these games. Why do you think Nabokov
stressed on (at least four occasions that I can count) that he shared a
birth date with the gender-bending playwright William Shakespeare? Why did
Nabokov so thoroughly raise the possibility of a Shakespearean conspiracy
within Bend Sinister? Why did he lie in his postscript "On a Book Entitled
Lolita" and state that a US publisher had once suggested to him that he
replace his 12 year old female nymphet with a boy?
Jo Morgan
Sydney
----- End forwarded message -----