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Fw: Fw: Rand v. Nabokov
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From: <nitrogen14@australia.edu>
> ----------------- Message requiring your approval (28
lines) ------------------
> I saw many superficial similarities between them long ago,
> ie before reading any of these postings:
> both russians, both fiercely pro-US, both haters of the
> USSR as only emigre russians could be
> both writers, writing in english
>
> and both with a similar harshness of tone -- certainly in their
interviews:
> the phrase "strong opinions" could describe everything Ayn Rand ever wrote
>
> I don't wish to offend anyone here, but there is (I think) an undeniable
> 'foreigness' in VN's english, like a metallic taste in water drunk out of
> an aluminium beaker -- faint, perhaps, but it's there, and the same taste
> is there in Ayn Rand's english, even though the literary merit of their
> prose cannot (of course) be compared
>
> differences are (as always in literary criticism) more important: and all
> of ayn rand's fiction is clearly poshlost
>
> is it possible to admire both? I doubt that it's possible to admire them
> both in the same way; but it's possible to feel a certain amused affection
> for ayn rand, while admiring VN.
>
> AR is (as a novelist) essentially a genre writer, but she shows that a
good
> genre writer can beat bad 'serious' writers (who abound in my own country,
> Australia) at their own (literary) game(s) [I am not referring to VN here]
>
>
>
From: <nitrogen14@australia.edu>
> ----------------- Message requiring your approval (28
lines) ------------------
> I saw many superficial similarities between them long ago,
> ie before reading any of these postings:
> both russians, both fiercely pro-US, both haters of the
> USSR as only emigre russians could be
> both writers, writing in english
>
> and both with a similar harshness of tone -- certainly in their
interviews:
> the phrase "strong opinions" could describe everything Ayn Rand ever wrote
>
> I don't wish to offend anyone here, but there is (I think) an undeniable
> 'foreigness' in VN's english, like a metallic taste in water drunk out of
> an aluminium beaker -- faint, perhaps, but it's there, and the same taste
> is there in Ayn Rand's english, even though the literary merit of their
> prose cannot (of course) be compared
>
> differences are (as always in literary criticism) more important: and all
> of ayn rand's fiction is clearly poshlost
>
> is it possible to admire both? I doubt that it's possible to admire them
> both in the same way; but it's possible to feel a certain amused affection
> for ayn rand, while admiring VN.
>
> AR is (as a novelist) essentially a genre writer, but she shows that a
good
> genre writer can beat bad 'serious' writers (who abound in my own country,
> Australia) at their own (literary) game(s) [I am not referring to VN here]
>
>
>