Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0001570, Tue, 17 Dec 1996 21:01:57 -0800

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nabokoviana (fwd)
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From: Allan McWilliams <alcuin@hotmail.com>

The front-page review/editorial of the Nov. 15 Kirkus Reviews by Bruce Allen
deals with the new, multi-volume _Oxford Mark Twain_. Allen mentions a number
of the introductions in the set, including one "...thoughtful and provocative
[by] Bobbie Ann Mason--who contributes an ingenious comparison of Twain to
Nabokov."

This same issue contains a review (p.1626) of a police novel, _Hyde_ by Dan
Mahoney, in which "...the villain, who calls himself 'Hyde' (a Nabokovian
physician who collects butterflies), is an old turn on the sophisticated
debauchee..."

December 8th's New York Times Book Review has an essay entitled "What's Gained
in Translation" in which the author, Douglas Hofstadter compares four English
translations of "Eugene Onegin." Hofstadter, "director of the Center for
Research on Concepts and Cognition and a professor of comparative literature at
Indiana U.," compares the translations of Charles Johnston, James Falen, Oliver
Elton and Walter Arndt. "Actually," he adds, "there is a fifth English version
still in print, this one done by Vladimir Nabokov in 1964--but for his own
strange reasons, he chose to do a literal translation that dropped all rhyme
and meter, a decision so catastrophic that I won't deal further with the
Nabokov 'Onegin' here."

Allan McWilliams
Rock Springs, Wyo.