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[Fwd: Re: LATH's "clystere de Tchekhov"]
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Regarding "Kalikakov": in Modern Greek, "kali" is "good" (fem. or pl.),
and
"kako" is "bad" (neut.), from which the nursery euphemism "kaka". I
don't
know if this leads anywhere, but there may be a distant echo of Gogol.
Akaky's name means something like "without sin" or "without evil," (the
"a"
prefix carrying negative valence), so it suggests his guilelessness, but
the very sound of the name cannot help but evoke the odor of "kaka."
Poor
Akaky's coat, and other clothing, is stained with crud, if not actual
crap.
"D. Barton Johnson" wrote:
> Sergey Il'yin, who is the Russian translator of VN's LOOK AT THE
> HARLEQUINS!, and many other VN works, poses the following query.
> ---------------------------------
> In Part 5, chapter One, Vadim decides to go the USSR to try to locate
> his daughter "Bel." In gathering information, he remarks:
>
> "I surrendered again --after quite a few years of abstinence! -- to the
> thrill of secret investigation. Spying had been my 'clystere de
> Tchekhov' even before I married Iris Black.... In my little way I have
> been of some help to my betters. The tree, a blue-flowering ash, whose
> cortical wound I caught the two 'diplomats;' Tornikovski and Kalikakov,
> using for the their correspondence, still stands, hardly scarred, on its
> hilltop above San Bernadino." (200)
>
> Sergey notes the similarity of "Tornikovski"'s name to that of Pushkin's
> "Dubrovski." One has a name from the root TORN which means "sloe" or
> "blackthorn," a kind of tree, while "Dubrovski" evokes "oak." The
> preceding name Tchekhov suggests a literary context. "Dubrovski" is, of
> course, a story by Pushkin where the eponymous hero uses the cavity in
> an oak tree as a post office for correspondence with his beloved Masha
> Trekurovaya. The store is, by the way, among the very first "spy novels"
> in Russian literture. Further -- the Russian term for VN's "ash tree"
> is YASEN' defined by lexicographer Dal' as "the tree PADUB, very
> similar to DUB (oak). And what about Kalikakov? The Indian godess Kali
> is six-armed. It is a simple step from Troekurova to Torekurova. As for
> Kalikakov -- "kak Kali," "kakov Kali" ?? Something of the sort.
> There may be something else going on here. "Blue-flowering" may be a
> hint at the nature of the relationship between the two "diplomats. And
> what is "San Bernadino" doing here. I've no idea but there whole
> thing is entertaining. What do you think?
--
Art, whose honesty must work through artifice, cannot avoid cheating
truth.
≈ Laura Riding
Regarding "Kalikakov": in Modern Greek, "kali" is "good" (fem. or pl.),
and
"kako" is "bad" (neut.), from which the nursery euphemism "kaka". I
don't
know if this leads anywhere, but there may be a distant echo of Gogol.
Akaky's name means something like "without sin" or "without evil," (the
"a"
prefix carrying negative valence), so it suggests his guilelessness, but
the very sound of the name cannot help but evoke the odor of "kaka."
Poor
Akaky's coat, and other clothing, is stained with crud, if not actual
crap.
"D. Barton Johnson" wrote:
> Sergey Il'yin, who is the Russian translator of VN's LOOK AT THE
> HARLEQUINS!, and many other VN works, poses the following query.
> ---------------------------------
> In Part 5, chapter One, Vadim decides to go the USSR to try to locate
> his daughter "Bel." In gathering information, he remarks:
>
> "I surrendered again --after quite a few years of abstinence! -- to the
> thrill of secret investigation. Spying had been my 'clystere de
> Tchekhov' even before I married Iris Black.... In my little way I have
> been of some help to my betters. The tree, a blue-flowering ash, whose
> cortical wound I caught the two 'diplomats;' Tornikovski and Kalikakov,
> using for the their correspondence, still stands, hardly scarred, on its
> hilltop above San Bernadino." (200)
>
> Sergey notes the similarity of "Tornikovski"'s name to that of Pushkin's
> "Dubrovski." One has a name from the root TORN which means "sloe" or
> "blackthorn," a kind of tree, while "Dubrovski" evokes "oak." The
> preceding name Tchekhov suggests a literary context. "Dubrovski" is, of
> course, a story by Pushkin where the eponymous hero uses the cavity in
> an oak tree as a post office for correspondence with his beloved Masha
> Trekurovaya. The store is, by the way, among the very first "spy novels"
> in Russian literture. Further -- the Russian term for VN's "ash tree"
> is YASEN' defined by lexicographer Dal' as "the tree PADUB, very
> similar to DUB (oak). And what about Kalikakov? The Indian godess Kali
> is six-armed. It is a simple step from Troekurova to Torekurova. As for
> Kalikakov -- "kak Kali," "kakov Kali" ?? Something of the sort.
> There may be something else going on here. "Blue-flowering" may be a
> hint at the nature of the relationship between the two "diplomats. And
> what is "San Bernadino" doing here. I've no idea but there whole
> thing is entertaining. What do you think?
--
Art, whose honesty must work through artifice, cannot avoid cheating
truth.
≈ Laura Riding