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Fw: VDN and Herzen
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EDNOTE. I do not recall seeing Sergey Karpukhin's "parallelism" in print but I find a marginal pencil note in my copy of the Boyd biography. It caught my eye because I had included that Herzen episode in EYEWITNESS, a Russian language reader that I co-compiled. BTW anyone at all interested in Russian history will enjoy Herzen's marvellous memoirs.
----- Original Message -----
From: Sergey Karpukhin
To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
Sent: Sunday, May 02, 2004 7:29 AM
Subject: VDN and Herzen
In Brian Boyd's THE RUSSIAN YEARS (I'm using the Russian translation actually) there described an episode (Chapter 1, IV) from Vladimir Dmitriyevich Nabokov's student life. In March 1890 he was arrested along with other students who demonstrated for academic freedoms and independence of universities. They were kept in custody till late evening, without the authorities starting an enquiry. And then the Petersburg general governor arrived and ordered to release Nabokov, a son of the former minister of justice. VDN asked if his friends would be released with him. As the answer to this was "No", he decided to stay in prison with friends.
In BYLOE I DUMY (Part 1, Chapter VI) A.I. Herzen tells about a similar episode from his own student life (he was arrested in consequence of the "Malov" affair - students evicted a rude and ignorant professor from the lecture room). VN wrote in SPEAK, MEMORY under the picture of their Petersburg house in Bolshaya Morskaya (Herzen Street under the Soviets) that BYLOE I DUMY was his father's favourite book.
Admittedly, Nabokov's readers evolve a special sensibility to all kinds of coincidence. This sensibility is the source of a great amount of individual intellectual joy when one finds some sort of significant pattern in details, but academically, as I have come to realise lately, it often feels like discovering electricity or inventing the camera lucida - people have been enjoying the pattern for years before one even was born. In short, sorry if has been noted and commented upon already.
Sincerely,
Sergey
----- Original Message -----
From: Sergey Karpukhin
To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
Sent: Sunday, May 02, 2004 7:29 AM
Subject: VDN and Herzen
In Brian Boyd's THE RUSSIAN YEARS (I'm using the Russian translation actually) there described an episode (Chapter 1, IV) from Vladimir Dmitriyevich Nabokov's student life. In March 1890 he was arrested along with other students who demonstrated for academic freedoms and independence of universities. They were kept in custody till late evening, without the authorities starting an enquiry. And then the Petersburg general governor arrived and ordered to release Nabokov, a son of the former minister of justice. VDN asked if his friends would be released with him. As the answer to this was "No", he decided to stay in prison with friends.
In BYLOE I DUMY (Part 1, Chapter VI) A.I. Herzen tells about a similar episode from his own student life (he was arrested in consequence of the "Malov" affair - students evicted a rude and ignorant professor from the lecture room). VN wrote in SPEAK, MEMORY under the picture of their Petersburg house in Bolshaya Morskaya (Herzen Street under the Soviets) that BYLOE I DUMY was his father's favourite book.
Admittedly, Nabokov's readers evolve a special sensibility to all kinds of coincidence. This sensibility is the source of a great amount of individual intellectual joy when one finds some sort of significant pattern in details, but academically, as I have come to realise lately, it often feels like discovering electricity or inventing the camera lucida - people have been enjoying the pattern for years before one even was born. In short, sorry if has been noted and commented upon already.
Sincerely,
Sergey