Vladimir Nabokov

Belokonsk in Ada; Wouwerman's white horse in Spring in Fialta

By Alexey Sklyarenko, 7 March, 2020

On Demonia (aka Antiterra, Earth’s twin planet on which VN’s novel Ada, 1969, is set) Whitehorse (a city in NW Canada) is known as Belokonsk:

 

In her erratic student years Aqua had left fashionable Brown Hill College, founded by one of her less reputable ancestors, to participate (as was also fashionable) in some Social Improvement project or another in the Severnïya Territorii. She organized with Milton Abraham’s invaluable help a Phree Pharmacy in Belokonsk, and fell grievously in love there with a married man, who after one summer of parvenu passion dispensed to her in his Camping Ford garçonnière preferred to give her up rather than run the risk of endangering his social situation in a philistine town where businessmen played ‘golf’ on Sundays and belonged to ‘lodges.’ The dreadful sickness, roughly diagnosed in her case, and in that of other unfortunate people, as an ‘extreme form of mystical mania combined with existalienation’ (otherwise plain madness), crept over her by degrees, with intervals of ecstatic peace, with skipped areas of precarious sanity, with sudden dreams of eternity-certainty, which grew ever rarer and briefer. (1.3)

 

In his poem Ya vyshel v noch’ (“I came out into the night,” 1902) Alexander Blok (the author of “Night, Street, Lamp, Drugstore…” 1912) mentions belyi kon’ (the white horse):

 

Я вышел в ночь - узнать, понять
Далёкий шорох, близкий ропот,
Несуществующих принять,
Поверить в мнимый конский топот.

Дорога, под луной бела,
Казалось, полнилась шагами.
Там только чья-то тень брела
И опустилась за холмами.

И слушал я - и услыхал:
Среди дрожащих лунных пятен
Далёко, звонко конь скакал,
И легкий посвист был понятен.

Но здесь, и дальше - ровный звук,
И сердце медленно боролось,
О, как понять, откуда стук,
Откуда будет слышен голос?

И вот, слышнее звон копыт,
И белый конь ко мне несётся...
И стало ясно, кто молчит
И на пустом седле смеётся.

Я вышел в ночь - узнать, понять
Далёкий шорох, близкий ропот,
Несуществующих принять,
Поверить в мнимый конский топот.

 

In her review of Blok’s first collection, Stikhi o Prekrasnoy Dame (“Verses about the Beautiful Lady,” 1904), Zinaida Hippius quotes the first and last stanza of Blok’s poem:

 

Не будем же требовать от этой милой книжки более того, что она может дать; она и так даёт нам много, освежает и утешает нас, посылает лёгкий, мгновенный отдых. Мы устаём от трезвого серого дня и его несомненностей. И мы рады, что поэт говорит нам:

  

Я вышел в ночь -- узнать, понять

Далёкий шорох, близкий ропот,

Несуществующих принять,

Поверить в мнимый конский топот…

 

Let’s not ask of this nice little book more than it can give; in fact, it gives us a lot, refreshing and consoling us, sending to us a light, instantaneous rest. We get tired of the sober gray day and its undoubtedness. And we are happy that the poet tells us:

 

I came out into the night – to learn, understand

a distant rustle, a near murmur,

to accept the inexistent creatures,

to believe in imaginary clatter of a horse’s hoofs.

 

According to Hippius, the Knight of the pale Beautiful Lady managed to grow only the faintly glimmering wings of a butterfly:

 

Нежный, слабый, паутинный, влюбленный столько же в смерть, сколько в жизнь, рыцарь бледной Прекрасной Дамы — сумел вырастить себе лишь слабо мерцающие крылья бабочки. Он неверными и короткими взлетами поднимается над пропастью; но пропасть широка; крылья бабочки не осилят её. Крылья бабочки скоро устают, быстро слабеют. (I)

 

The name Hippius brings to mind “Tu es tres hippique ce matin,” Segur’s words in VN’s story Vesna v Fial'te (“Spring in Fialta,” 1936):

 

 -- Критика!-- воскликнул он.-- Хороша критика! Всякая тёмная личность мне читает мораль. Благодарю покорно. К моим книгам притрагиваются с опаской, как к неизвестному электрическому аппарату. Их разбирают со всех точек зрения, кроме существенной. Вроде того, как если бы натуралист, толкуя о лошади, начал говорить о сёдлах, чепраках или M-me de V. (он назвал даму литературного света, в самом деле очень похожую на оскаленную лошадь). Я тоже хочу этой голубиной крови,-- продолжал он тем же громким, рвущим голосом, обращаясь к лакею, который понял его желание, посмотрев по направлению перста, бесцеремонно указывавшего на стакан англичанина. Сегюр упомянул имя общего знакомого, художника, любившего писать стекло, и разговор принял менее оскорбительный характер. Между тем англичанин вдруг решительно поднялся, встал на стул, оттуда шагнул на подоконник и, выпрямившись во весь свой громадный рост, снял с верхнего угла оконницы и ловко перевел в коробок ночную бабочку с бобровой спинкой.

 -- ...это, как белая лошадь Вувермана,-- сказал Фердинанд, рассуждая о чём-то с Сегюром.

-- Tu es trés hippique ce matin,-- заметил тот.

 

"Criticism!" he exclaimed. "Fine criticism! Every slick jackanapes sees fit to read me a lecture. Ignorance of my work is their bliss. My books are touched gingerly, as one touches something that may go bang. Criticism! They are examined from every point of view except the essential one. It is as if a naturalist, in describing the equine genus, started to jaw about saddles or Mme. de V. (he named a well-known literary hostess, who indeed strongly resembled a grinning horse). I would like some of that pigeon's blood, too," he continued in the same loud, ripping voice, addressing the waiter, who understood his desire only after he had looked in the direction of the long-nailed finger which unceremoniously pointed at the Englishman's glass. For some reason or other, Segur mentioned Ruby Rose, the lady who painted flowers on her breast, and the conversation took on a less insulting character. Meanwhile the big Englishman suddenly made up his mind, got up on a chair, stepped from there onto the windowsill, and stretched up till he reached that coveted corner of the frame where rested a compact furry moth, which he deftly slipped into a pillbox.

“… rather like Wouwerman’s white horse,” said Ferdinand, in regard to something he was discussing with Segur.
  “Tu es très hippique ce matin,” remarked the latter.

 

Neizvestnyi elektricheskiy apparat (something that may go bang) mentioned by Ferdinand (Nina’s husband, a Franco-Hungarian writer) brings to mind Hippius’ poem Elektrichestvo (“Electricity,” 1901). After the L disaster in the beau milieu of the 19th century electricity was banned on Antiterra.

 

Describing his journey with Lucette on Admiral Tobakoff, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in Ada) mentions Spring in Fialta and a torrid May on Minataor, the famous artificial island:

 

To most of the Tobakoff’s first-class passengers the afternoon of June 4, 1901, in the Atlantic, on the meridian of Iceland and the latitude of Ardis, seemed little conducive to open air frolics: the fervor of its cobalt sky kept being cut by glacial gusts, and the wash of an old-fashioned swimming pool rhythmically flushed the green tiles, but Lucette was a hardy girl used to bracing winds no less than to the detestable sun. Spring in Fialta and a torrid May on Minataor, the famous artificial island, had given a nectarine hue to her limbs, which looked lacquered with it when wet, but re-evolved their natural bloom as the breeze dried her skin. With glowing cheekbones and that glint of copper showing from under her tight rubber cap on nape and forehead, she evoked the Helmeted Angel of the Yukonsk Ikon whose magic effect was said to change anemic blond maidens into konskie deti, freckled red-haired lads, children of the Sun Horse. (3.5)

 

Miss May (1907) is a story by Zinaida Hippius. Minataor is an anagram of Taormina. The second stanza of Hippius’ poem Apel’sinnye tsvety (“The Orange Blossom,” 1897) begins with the line Pod serym nebom Taorminy (beneath gray sky of Taormina):

 

Под серым небом Таормины
Среди глубин некрасоты
На миг припомнились единый
Мне апельсинные цветы.

 

Beneath gray sky of Taormina

amidst the depths of non-beauty

I recalled for a moment

the orange blossom.

 

Pod serym nebom Taorminy brings to mind Pod znoynym nebom Argentiny, a tango that Van dances on his hands as Mascodagama (Van’s stage name):

 

Neither was the sheer physical pleasure of maniambulation a negligible factor, and the peacock blotches with which the carpet stained the palms of his hands during his gloveless dance routine seemed to be the reflections of a richly colored nether world that he had been the first to discover. For the tango, which completed his number on his last tour, he was given a partner, a Crimean cabaret dancer in a very short scintillating frock cut very low on the back. She sang the tango tune in Russian:

 

Pod znóynïm nébom Argentínï,

Pod strástnïy góvor mandolinï

 

‘Neath sultry sky of Argentina,

To the hot hum of mandolina

 

Fragile, red-haired ‘Rita’ (he never learned her real name), a pretty Karaite from Chufut Kale, where, she nostalgically said, the Crimean cornel, kizil’, bloomed yellow among the arid rocks, bore an odd resemblance to Lucette as she was to look ten years later. During their dance, all Van saw of her were her silver slippers turning and marching nimbly in rhythm with the soles of his hands. He recouped himself at rehearsals, and one night asked her for an assignation. She indignantly refused, saying she adored her husband (the make-up fellow) and loathed England. (1.30)

 

The orange blossom in Hippius’ poem brings to mind Ronald Oranger, old Van’s secretary (and the editor of Ada) who marries Violet Knox (old Van’s typist whom Ada calls Fialochka, "little violet") after Van’s and Ada’s death. Nochnaya Fialka (“The Night Violet,” 1906) is a poem in blank verse subtitled Son (“A Dream”) by Blok. At the beginning of "Spring in Fialta" the narrator mentions the sweet dark dampness of the most rumpled of small flowers:

 

Я этот городок люблю; потому ли, что во впадине его названия мне слышится сахаристо-сырой запах мелкого, тёмного, самого мятого из цветов, и не в тон, хотя внятное, звучание Ялты; потому ли, что его сонная весна особенно умащивает душу, не знаю; но как я был рад очнуться в нём, и вот шлёпать вверх, навстречу ручьям, без шапки, с мокрой головой, в макинтоше, надетом прямо на рубашку!

 

I am fond of Fialta; I am fond of it because I feel in the hollow of those violaceous syllables the sweet dark dampness of the most rumpled of small flowers, and because the altolike name of a lovely Crimean town is echoed by its viola; and also because there is something in the very somnolence of its humid Lent that especially anoints one's soul. So I was happy to be there again, to trudge uphill in inverse direction to the rivulet of the gutter, hatless, my head wet, my skin already suffused with warmth although I wore only a light mackintosh over my shirt.

 

A lovely Crimean town is Yalta. According to Van, the names Yalta and Altyn Tagh sounded strangely attractive to poor mad Aqua (Marina’s twin sister):

 

Actually, Aqua was less pretty, and far more dotty, than Marina. During her fourteen years of miserable marriage she spent a broken series of steadily increasing sojourns in sanatoriums. A small map of the European part of the British Commonwealth — say, from Scoto-Scandinavia to the Riviera, Altar and Palermontovia — as well as most of the U.S.A., from Estoty and Canady to Argentina, might be quite thickly prickled with enameled red-cross-flag pins, marking, in her War of the Worlds, Aqua’s bivouacs. She had plans at one time to seek a modicum of health (‘just a little grayishness, please, instead of the solid black’) in such Anglo-American protectorates as the Balkans and Indias, and might even have tried the two Southern Continents that thrive under our joint dominion. Of course, Tartary, an independent inferno, which at the time spread from the Baltic and Black seas to the Pacific Ocean, was touristically unavailable, though Yalta and Altyn Tagh sounded strangely attractive… But her real destination was Terra the Fair and thither she trusted she would fly on libellula long wings when she died. Her poor little letters from the homes of madness to her husband were sometimes signed: Madame Shchemyashchikh-Zvukov (‘Heart rending-Sounds’). (1.3)

 

Aqua’s pseudonym seems to hint at shchemyashchiy zvuk (the heart-rending sound) mentioned by Alexander Blok in the first line of his poem Priblizhaetsya zvuk... (“A sound approaches...” 1912):

 

Приближается звук. И, покорна щемящему звуку,
Молодеет душа.
И во сне прижимаю к губам твою прежнюю руку,
Не дыша.

 

A sound approaches. And, obedient to the heart-rending sound,

my soul gets younger.

And in a dream I press to my lips your former hand,

not breathing.

 

Blok is the author of "To E. A. Baratynski" (1900):

 

                                Так мгновенные созданья
                                Поэтической мечты
                                Исчезают от дыханья
                                Посторонней суеты. Баратынский

 

Тебе, поэт, в вечерней тишине
Мои мечты, волненья и досуги.
Близь Музы, ветреной подруги,
Попировать недолго, видно, мне.

Придёт пора — она меня покинет,
Настанет час тревожной суеты,
И прихоть лёгкая задумчивой мечты
В моей груди увянет и застынет.

 

In his poem Poslednyaya smert’ (“The Last Death,” 1827) Baratynski mentions iskusstvennye ostrova (the artificial islands):

 

Сначала мир явил мне дивный сад:
Везде искусств, обилия приметы;
Близ веси весь и подле града град,
Везде дворцы, театры, водометы,
Везде народ, и хитрый свой закон
Стихии все признать заставил он.
Уж он морей мятежные пучины
На островах искусственных селил,
Уж рассекал небесные равнины
По прихоти им вымышленных крил;
Всё на земле движением дышало,
Всё на земле как будто ликовало.

 

Minataor is the famous artificial island. Btw., "konskie deti, children of the Sun Horse," bring to mind Balmont's collection Budem kak solntse ("Let's be like the Sun," 1902) and O esli b znali, deti, vy (O if you only knew, children), the penultimate line of Blok's poem Golos iz khora ("Voice from Choir," 1910-14):

 

Как часто плачем — вы и я —
Над жалкой жизнию своей!
О, если б знали вы, друзья,
Холод и мрак грядущих дней!

Теперь ты милой руку жмешь,
Играешь с нею, шутя,
И плачешь ты, заметив ложь,
Или в руке любимой нож,
Дитя, дитя!

Лжи и коварству меры нет,
А смерть — далека.
Всё будет чернее страшный свет,
И всё безумней вихрь планет
Еще века, века!

И век последний, ужасней всех,
Увидим и вы и я.
Всё небо скроет гнусный грех,
На всех устах застынет смех,
Тоска небытия...

Весны, дитя, ты будешь ждать —
Весна обманет.
Ты будешь солнце на небо звать —
Солнце не встанет.
И крик, когда ты начнешь кричать,
Как камень, канет...

Будьте ж довольны жизнью своей,
Тише воды, ниже травы!
О, если б знали, дети, вы,
Холод и мрак грядущих дней!

 

How often we do cry - so we and I -
For the miserable, poor our life!
Oh, how you'd foreseen the future dark,
The coldness of days, friends mine!

Now you are pressing hands of dear girl,
And play with her, and joke her,
But cry, when you are marking once
The lie from lips, in hands — the sword.
Oh, baby, girl!

There's no measure to the lie, insidiousness,
And death — is far.
The blacker will be real world, nevetherless,
The frenzier will be the whirl of planets
For centuries and centuries!

The last of centuries, the cruelest of ones,
Will meet — as we, so I.
By sin will be then hided poor skies,
By frost — the lips'll be stunned.
The grief of no life...

And you will wait for spring, the spring —
But sping will you deceive.
You'll call for sun to shine — but it
Will not rise up to lit.
And cry, when you to cry begin
Will fall in vain within...

Be glad now with your life mere,
Quiter than water, quieter than grass!
Oh, if you could foresee, children,
The future cold, the future dark!

(tr. L. Purgina)