In VN’s novel Priglashenie na kazn’ (“Invitation to a Beheading,” 1935) the death sentence is announced to Cincinnatus in a whisper:
Сообразно с законом, Цинциннату Ц. объявили смертный приговор шёпотом. Все встали, обмениваясь улыбками. Седой судья, припав к его уху, подышав, сообщив, медленно отодвинулся, как будто отлипал.
In accordance with the law the death sentence was announced to Cincinnatus C. in a whisper. All rose, exchanging smiles. The hoary judge put his mouth close to his ear, panted for a moment, made the announcement and slowly moved away, as though ungluing himself. (Chapter One)
In his Stikhi, sochinyonnye noch'yu vo vremya bessonnitsy ("Verses Composed at Night during the Insomnia," 1830) Pushkin mentions skuchnyi shyopot (dreary whisper):
Мне не спится, нет огня;
Всюду мрак и сон докучный.
Ход часов лишь однозвучный
Раздаётся близ меня,
Парки бабье лепетанье,
Спящей ночи трепетанье,
Жизни мышья беготня...
Что тревожишь ты меня?
Что ты значишь, скучный шёпот?
Укоризна, или ропот
Мной утраченного дня?
От меня чего ты хочешь?
Ты зовёшь или пророчишь?
Я понять тебя хочу,
Смысла я в тебе ищу...
I can't sleep, the light is out;
Chasing senseless dreams in gloom.
Clocks at once, inside my room,
Somewhere next to me, resound.
Parcae's soft and mild chatter,
Sleeping twilight's noisy flutter,
Life's commotion -- so insane..
Why am I to feel this pain?
What's your meaning, boring mumble?
Disapproving, do you grumble
Of the day I spent in vain?
What has made you so compelling?
Are you calling or foretelling?
I just want to understand,
Thus I'm seeking your intent...
(Transl. M. Kneller)
The poem's second line, Vsyudu mrak i son dokuchnyi (everywhere is the dark and the tiresome sleep) recalls mrik-mrak ("Click. Black," the sound with which the light is turned off in Cincinnatus' cell) and Kapitan Sonnyi (Captain Somnus), the founder of the State in which Cincinnatus lives.
Khod chasov lish' odnozvuchnyi (only the clock's monotonous sound) in the third line brings to mind the clock in "Invitation to a Beheading:"
Пробили часы -- четыре или пять раз, и казематный отгул их, перегул и загулок вели себя подобающим образом.
A clock struck — four or five times — with the vibrations and re-vibrations, and reverberations proper to a prison. (Chapter One)
Опять с банальной унылостью пробили часы. Время шло в арифметической прогрессии: восемь.
With banal dreariness the clock struck again. Time was advancing in arithmetical progression: it was now eight. (ibid.)
The clock in the fortress is painted by the watchman:
Оба молчали, не глядя друг на друга, между тем как с бессмысленной гулкостью били часы.
- Вы обратите внимание, когда выйдете, - сказал Цинциннат, - на часы в коридоре. Это - пустой циферблат, но зато каждые полчаса сторож смывает старую стрелку и малюет новую, - вот так и живёшь по крашенному времени, а звон производит часовой, почему он так и зовётся.
They both remained silent, not looking at each other, while the clock struck with nonsensical resonance. ‘When you go out,’ said Cincinnatus, ‘note the clock in the corridor. The dial is blank; however, every hour the watchman washes off the old hand and daubs on a new one — and that’s how we live, by tarbrush time, and the ringing is the work of the watchman, which is why he is called a “watch” man.’ (Chapter Twelve)
Krashenoe vremya (tarbrush time) and Kapitan Sonnyi (Captain Somnus) bring to mind Khudozhnik-varvar kist'yu sonnoy (the artist-barbarian with his somnolent brush), the first line of Pushkin's poem Vozrozhdenie ("Rebirth," 1819).
In his poem May 26, 1828 Pushkin calls life dar naprasnyi, dar sluchayinyi ("a vain gift, a chance gift") and asks why it is condemned to kazn' (execution) by the secret Fate:
Дар напрасный, дар случайный,
Жизнь, зачем ты мне дана?
Иль зачем судьбою тайной
Ты на казнь осуждена?
Кто меня враждебной властью
Из ничтожества воззвал,
Душу мне наполнил страстью,
Ум сомненьем взволновал?..
Цели нет передо мною:
Сердце пусто, празден ум,
И томит меня тоскою
Однозвучный жизни шум.
A gift in vain, a gift by chance,
O Life, why have you been given to me?
And why have you been sentenced to death
By inscrutable fate?
Who has called me forth from nothingness
By his hostile power,
And filled my soul with suffering
And my mind with anguishing doubt?...
There is no goal before me:
My heart is empty, my mind lies idle,
And the monotonous din of life
torments me with anguish.
Odnozvuchnyi zhizni shum (the monotonous din of life) in the last line is echoed by khod chasov lish' odnozvuchnyi (only the clock's monotonous sound) in "Verses Composed at Night during the Insomnia."
VN interrupted his work on Dar ("The Gift," 1937) to write Priglashenie na kazn'.
In Pushkin's Table-Talk (1835-36) there are several anecdotes about Prince Potyomkin (a favorite of the Empress Catherine II). The name Potyomkin comes from potyomki (darkness) and brings to mind the saying chuzhaya dusha - potyomki (you cannot read in another's soul).
Cincinnatus was sentenced to death because others (all of whom are transparent to each other) cannot see through him.
The main and only purpose of this brief note is to draw your attention to the full version (https://thenabokovian.org/node/35788) of my previous post, "Captain Somnus in Invitation to a Beheading; bretteur & Pierre Legrand in Ada."