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Re: Nabokov mentioned by B. R. Myers (fwd)
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From: Will Schultz <willtato@pacbell.net>
It is worth mentioning in this context that VN himself was not very fond of
Laughter in the Dark. I read this in either Strong Opinions or Andrew
Field's VN - the Life and Art of.
> Galya Diment wrote:
>
> > From: JR <bixx@mindspring.com>
> >
> > I'm sorry but I have to comment here: <sarcasm>what and where on earth are
> > Myers' sources for this claim of least-respect? Aside from the seat of his
> > pants, that is. Is there a chart of respectability? Has he seen somebody
> > spitting on a copy of Laughter in the Dark? Is this part of the vast
> > critical conspiracy, fearlessly unearthed by Myers' in his Atlantic article,
> > to relegate good old-fashioned storytelling to the rubbish heap in favor of
> > that...that...fancy-pants stuff like Lolita? </sarcasm>I'm afraid these
> > sorts of generalities are as bad as anything Myers affects to sniff out in
> > those terrible, terrible novels of DeLillo and Proulx.
> >
> > Joshua Roberts
> >
> > **** I suspect, but may of course be wrong, that by "least respected" Mr.
> > Myers simply means least talked about in the "mainstream" critical
> > discourse -- and it would be hard to argue with him there. We also have
> > been witnessing, on the other hand and most recently with The Luzhin
> > Defence, the movie, how some of these more "obscure," i.e. Russian period,
> > novels become eventually "mainstreamed" in one fashion or the other.
> >
> > On a different note, since I have the floor, I would also like to mention
> > that during today's Talk of the Nation (NPR) discussion of the
> > controversial Ohio child pornography case (Brian Dalton's diary), the talk
> > briefly turned to Nabokov and whether he could have been prosecuted by the
> > same Ohio law for writing _Lolita_. GD***
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "Galya Diment" <galya@u.washington.edu>
> > To: <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
> > Sent: Tuesday, July 31, 2001 2:06 PM
> > Subject: Nabokov mentioned by B. R. Myers (fwd)
> >
> > > From: D.K. Holm <dkholm@pop.nwlink.com>
> > >
> > >
> > > Readers of this forum are probably familiar with the Atlantic article by
> > B.
> > > R. Myers, and the "controversy" it has fueled in literary circles. ......:
> > >
> > >
> > > Myers: Henry de Montherlant said that the main things a writer needs are
> > > the gift of observation and the gift of imagery. Nabokov displays both
> > > these gifts in Laughter in the Dark, but the story is so involving that
> > > you are barely conscious of his presence at all; instead, you see life
> > > through the eyes of a poet as if this were the most natural thing in the
> > > world. Today, needless to say, Laughter in the Dark is one of Nabokov's
> > > least-respected novels in the U.S.
> > >
> > > Readers interested in full interview and several articles about Myers's
> > > manifesto can find links at http://www.Mobylives.com/.
> > >
> > > D. K. Holm
> > > Cinemonkey.com