Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0010396, Wed, 29 Sep 2004 19:19:50 -0700

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Fwd: TT-18 Introductory Notes
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----- Forwarded message from a-nakata@courante.plala.or.jp -----
Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 09:45:15 +0900
From: Akiko Nakata <a-nakata@courante.plala.or.jp>


68.04: (the dutiful daughter came too late): could be a sarcastic echo of
*Le Pere Goriot* in the previous chapter. Dying Goriot called for his
beloved daughters, but neither would not come to see their father in time.

68.05-06: another American writer, also residing in Switzerland: probably
alludes to VN.

68.09-10: a graveled path with streams of bubbly rainwater running on either
side: I think I have seen a scene like this in VN's works--I cannot recall
where.

68.13-14:She now wore again the pretty pageboy hairdo of the past and the
same orange blouse: Cf. "Shall I now see her in dreams with those new
eyebrows, that new long hair? . . . Will the next dream still stick to her
Japanese-doll hairdo?" (Ch. 13).

68.17: and turned out to be a totally different girl: Cf. "and abruptly
changing into a goggled stranger" (Ch. 15).

68.19: in Morocco: The Othello theme.

69.25: a can of apricot juice: I have been puzzled--why apricot juice? Is
there anything behind it? Are apricots a special product there?

70.03-06: when a timid editor made the artist change "slender" to "plump,"
or "brown" to "blond" he disfigured both the image and the niche where it
stood and the entire chapel around it: In the next chapter, HP finds "the
author *had* made her [Julia] fair-haired, and played down the Eurasian
quality of her beauty."

70.13-14: with a little knowing air, as the French say: Is "with a little
knowing air" originally a literal translation of "avec un petit air
entendu"? I thought the English idiom was commonly used. Or "as the French
say" refers to such snobbery in literary salons?

70.27-28: the tongue tended to substitute an "l" for the second of the three
"t's": reminds the reader how to pronounce "Lolita." Cf. "'Lolita' should
not be pronounced in the English or Russian fashion . . . but with a trill
of Latin "l" and a delicate toothy "t" (SO 138).

71.04: "So long and soon see": As a character, Mr. R. does not know that he
will never see HP again; as the narrator, he knows that he will see him
rather soon, after 30 pages.

Akiko Nakata

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