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Re: TT 3-4-5
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Date: Saturday, July 31, 2004 10:08 AM -0700
From: naiman <naiman@socrates.Berkeley.EDU>
------------------ Nabokov's favorite play is definitely in play. In
addition to the caviar already noted -- caviar which, if memory serves (I
am still away from my library), surfaces in the Variorum and in BS (as
glossed by Boyd), we have the worms (Polonius) and the mouse. Polonius is
particularly important here, since the father's death is a parodic
revision of his death behind the arras (note the "what became in
retrospect a DRAMATIC gesture"). Is the vain blonde in black a parodic
replay of Gertrude who has not respected the proper conventions of
mourning?
Wonderful, too, and typical how VN, while telling us to pay attention
deflects us from what may be really important -- Shakespeare "earthworm's
digestive tract (but watch, watch, do not be deflected!)" In this
chapter, it would seemthat we have to pay attention beginning with the end
of the second paragraph (Now comes the act of attention), a sentence which
would seem to free us from the obligation of analyzing or returning to
what we have just read. But there we have the bulbless and shadeless
lamp, the heedless servent, the CARCASS of a broken umbrella, all
important foreshadowing of the chapter five.
On the taking of an image back to the slaughterhouse --- the film which
does this most famously is Vertov's Kinoglaz, a film VN probably saw in
the 20s. Vertov takes sausages back to show their production -- the film
runs backwards as meat is converted to cows (Martin Amis uses this device
too in his backwards novel). This was a Marxist trope -- emphasizing a
commodity's conditions of production (but see Anne Nesbet's deconstruction
of this in Savage Junctures); VN would seem to be playing on this notion
by insisting on following the trajectory of an aesthetic object -- with
distinctly non-political purposes.
On Sandy Drescher's discomfort (if that is the right word) with the
deadness of the characters, I would suggest that this is precisely the
point. TT would seem to lie far closer to the metaphysical than the
metaficitve pole, but it may lie so close as to make the metafictive
reading the more profound. What does it mean to be a reader and not to
sink? This would mean not falling for the illusion of reality and
remaining on the surface of the text, staying with the words and not
falling for the fiction of representation. This close reading is all
about not sinking or, if we sink, it is sinking of a different kind, into
philology word reference, staying with the material of our trade. By no
means would this be the first time that readers and authors serve as
ghosts (from the perspective of the characters).
Eric
> ===== Original Message From Vladimir Nabokov Forum
<NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU> =====
> -------------------
> I heard thee speak me a speech once, but it was never acted;
> or if it was, not above once; for the play, I remember, pleas'd
> not the million, 'twas caviary to the general; but it was (as I
> receiv'd it, and others, whose judgments in such matters cried in
> the top of mine) an excellent play, well digested in the scenes,
> set down with as much modesty as cunning. --HAMLET
>
>
> ---------- End Forwarded Message ----------
>
>
>
> D. Barton Johnson
> NABOKV-L
---------- End Forwarded Message ----------
D. Barton Johnson
NABOKV-L
Date: Saturday, July 31, 2004 10:08 AM -0700
From: naiman <naiman@socrates.Berkeley.EDU>
------------------ Nabokov's favorite play is definitely in play. In
addition to the caviar already noted -- caviar which, if memory serves (I
am still away from my library), surfaces in the Variorum and in BS (as
glossed by Boyd), we have the worms (Polonius) and the mouse. Polonius is
particularly important here, since the father's death is a parodic
revision of his death behind the arras (note the "what became in
retrospect a DRAMATIC gesture"). Is the vain blonde in black a parodic
replay of Gertrude who has not respected the proper conventions of
mourning?
Wonderful, too, and typical how VN, while telling us to pay attention
deflects us from what may be really important -- Shakespeare "earthworm's
digestive tract (but watch, watch, do not be deflected!)" In this
chapter, it would seemthat we have to pay attention beginning with the end
of the second paragraph (Now comes the act of attention), a sentence which
would seem to free us from the obligation of analyzing or returning to
what we have just read. But there we have the bulbless and shadeless
lamp, the heedless servent, the CARCASS of a broken umbrella, all
important foreshadowing of the chapter five.
On the taking of an image back to the slaughterhouse --- the film which
does this most famously is Vertov's Kinoglaz, a film VN probably saw in
the 20s. Vertov takes sausages back to show their production -- the film
runs backwards as meat is converted to cows (Martin Amis uses this device
too in his backwards novel). This was a Marxist trope -- emphasizing a
commodity's conditions of production (but see Anne Nesbet's deconstruction
of this in Savage Junctures); VN would seem to be playing on this notion
by insisting on following the trajectory of an aesthetic object -- with
distinctly non-political purposes.
On Sandy Drescher's discomfort (if that is the right word) with the
deadness of the characters, I would suggest that this is precisely the
point. TT would seem to lie far closer to the metaphysical than the
metaficitve pole, but it may lie so close as to make the metafictive
reading the more profound. What does it mean to be a reader and not to
sink? This would mean not falling for the illusion of reality and
remaining on the surface of the text, staying with the words and not
falling for the fiction of representation. This close reading is all
about not sinking or, if we sink, it is sinking of a different kind, into
philology word reference, staying with the material of our trade. By no
means would this be the first time that readers and authors serve as
ghosts (from the perspective of the characters).
Eric
> ===== Original Message From Vladimir Nabokov Forum
<NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU> =====
> -------------------
> I heard thee speak me a speech once, but it was never acted;
> or if it was, not above once; for the play, I remember, pleas'd
> not the million, 'twas caviary to the general; but it was (as I
> receiv'd it, and others, whose judgments in such matters cried in
> the top of mine) an excellent play, well digested in the scenes,
> set down with as much modesty as cunning. --HAMLET
>
>
> ---------- End Forwarded Message ----------
>
>
>
> D. Barton Johnson
> NABOKV-L
---------- End Forwarded Message ----------
D. Barton Johnson
NABOKV-L