In his Commentary and Index to Shade’s poem Kinbote (in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, Shade’s mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla) mentions Kalixhaven, a colorful seaport on the western coast, a few miles north of Blawick:
Gradus never became a real success in the glass business to which he turned again and again between his win-eselling and pamphlet printing jobs. He started as a maker of Cartesian devils--imps of bottle glass bobbing up and down in methylate-filled tubes hawked during Catkin Week on the boulevards. He also worked as a teazer, and later as a flasher, at governmental factories--and was, I believe, more or less responsible for the remarkably ugly red-and-amber windows in the great public lavatory at rowdy but colorful Kalixhaven where the sailors are. He claimed to have improved the glitter and rattle of the so-called feuilles-d'alarme used by the grape growers and orchardmen to scare the birds. I have staggered the notes referring to him in such a fashion that the first note to line 17 where some of his other activities are adumbrated) is the vaguest while those that follow become gradually clearer as gradual Gradus approaches in space and time. (note to Line 171)
Catkin Week is called in Russian verbnaya nedelya. In his poem Verbnaya subbota ("Palm Saturday," 1903) Alexander Blok mentions zamorskie gosti (oversees guests) whom the tsar and the boyars saw in their dreams:
Вечерние люди уходят в дома.
Над городом синяя ночь зажжена.
Боярышни тихо идут в терема.
По улице веет, гуляет весна.
На улице праздник, на улице свет,
И свечки, и вербы встречают зарю.
Дремотная сонь, неуловленный бред
Заморские гости приснились царю...
Приснились боярам...– «Проснитесь, мы тут...»
Боярышня сонно склонилась во мгле...
Там тени идут и виденья плывут...
Что было на небе – теперь на земле...
Весеннее утро. Задумчивый сон.
Влюбленные гости заморских племен
И, может быть, поздних, веселых времен.
Прозрачная тучка. Жемчужный узор.
Там было свиданье. Там был разговор...
И к утру лишь бледной рукой отперлась,
И розовой зорькой душа занялась.
In Kinbote’s Index the entry Kinbote, Charles, Dr is preceded by the entry Kalixhaven:
Kalixhaven, a colorful seaport on the western coast, a few miles north of Blawick (q. v.), 171; many pleasant memories.
Kalixhaven seems to hint at Kalix, a small town in Swedish Lapland near the coast of the Gulf of Bothnia. In 1732 Carl Linnaeus (a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming organisms, and who is known as the “father of modern taxonomy”) traveled to Lapland. After his six-month-long expedition Linnaeus wrote Flora Lapponica. The full name of Charles the Beloved (the last king of Zembla) is Charles Xavier Vseslav. In VN’s novel Ada (1969) Ada shows to Van the portrait of her favorite ancestor, Prince Vseslav Zemski (1699-1797), friend of Linnaeus and author of Flora Ladorica. Linnaeus studied at Uppsala University and later became professor of botany and principal at the same University. In Ada, one of Van's schoolmates at Riverlane is a hysterical lad from Upsala:
That was love, normal and mysterious. Less mysterious and considerably more grotesque were the passions which several generations of schoolmasters had failed to eradicate, and which as late as 1883 still enjoyed an unparalleled vogue at Riverlane. Every dormitory had its catamite. One hysterical lad from Upsala, cross-eyed, loose-lipped, with almost abnormally awkward limbs, but with a wonderfully tender skin texture and the round creamy charms of Bronzino’s Cupid (the big one, whom a delighted satyr discovers in a lady’s bower), was much prized and tortured by a group of foreign boys, mostly Greek and English, led by Cheshire, the rugby ace; and partly out of bravado, partly out of curiosity, Van surmounted his disgust and coldly watched their rough orgies. Soon, however, he abandoned this surrogate for a more natural though equally heartless divertissement. (1.4)
Like Brownhill (Ada's school for girls), Riverlane has erotic connotations. The name Kalix is believed to originate from the Sami word Gáláseatnu, or "Kalasätno", meaning "the cold river," the ancient name of the Kalix River.
According to Kinbote, Blawick means in Zemblan “blue cove:”
Blawick, Blue Cove, a pleasant seaside resort on the Western Coast of Zembla, casino, golf course, sea food, boats for hire, 149.
The King leaves Zembla in a powerful motorboat that was prepared in the Rippleson Caves near Blawick:
Three hours later he trod level ground. Two old women working in an orchard unbent in slow motion and stared after him. He had passed the pine groves of Boscobel and was approaching the quay of Blawick; when a black police car turned out on a transverse road and pulled up next to him: "The joke has gone too far," said the driver. "One hundred clowns are packed in Onhava jail, and the ex-King should be among them. Our local prison is much too small for more kings. The next masquerader will be shot at sight. What's your real name, Charlie?"
"I'm British. I'm a tourist," said the King. "Well, anyway, take off that red fufa. And the cap. Give them here." He tossed the things in the back of the car and drove off.
The King walked on; the top of his blue pajamas tucked into his skiing pants might easily pass for a fancy shirt. There was a pebble in his left shoe but he was too fagged out to do anything about it.
He recognized the seashore restaurant where many years earlier he had lunched incognito with two amusing, very amusing, sailors. Several heavily armed Extremists were drinking beer on the geranium-lined veranda, among the routine vacationists, some of whom were busy writing to distant friends. Through the geraniums, a gloved hand gave the King a picture postcard on which he found scribbled: Proceed to R. C. Bon voyage! Feigning a casual stroll, he reached the end of the embankment. (note to Line 149)
In his poem V Severnom more (“In a Northern Sea”) from the cycle Vol'nye mysli ("Free Thoughts," 1907) Blok describes a sea voyage in a big-bellied and funny motorboat and mentions mnogotsventaya ryab’ (many-colored ripples) on the water:
И с длинного, протянутого в море,
Подгнившего, сереющего мола,
Прочтя все надписи: "Навек с тобой",
"Здесь были Коля с Катей", "Диодор
Иеромонах и послушник Исидор
Здесь были. Дивны божии дела", -
Прочтя все надписи, выходим в море
В пузатой и смешной моторной лодке.
Бензин пыхтит и пахнет. Два крыла
Бегут в воде за нами. Вьётся быстрый след,
И, обогнув скучающих на пляже,
Рыбачьи лодки, узкий мыс, маяк,
Мы выбегаем многоцветной рябью
В просторную ласкающую соль.
Blok was a grandson of Andrey Beketov (1825-1902), a prominent botanist. In the Foreword to his poem Vozmezdie (“Retribution,” 1910-21) Blok mentions those infinitely high qualities that once shined like luchshie almazy v chelovecheskoy korone (the best diamonds in man’s crown), such as humanism, virtues, impeccable honesty, rectitude, etc.:
Тема заключается в том, как развиваются звенья единой цепи рода. Отдельные отпрыски всякого рода развиваются до положенного им предела и затем вновь поглощаются окружающей мировой средой; но в каждом отпрыске зреет и отлагается нечто новое и нечто более острое, ценою бесконечных потерь, личных трагедий, жизненных неудач, падений и т. д.; ценою, наконец, потери тех бесконечно высоких свойств, которые в своё время сияли, как лучшие алмазы в человеческой короне (как, например, свойства гуманные, добродетели, безупречная честность, высокая нравственность и проч.)
In the last stanza of his poem Neznakomka (“The Unknown Woman,” 1906) Blok says that a treasure lies in his soul and the key is entrusted to him alone:
В моей душе лежит сокровище,
И ключ поручен только мне!
Ты право, пьяное чудовище!
Я знаю: истина в вине.
A treasure lies in my soul,
and the key is entrusted to me alone!
You are correct, you drunken fiend!
I know: in wine is truth.