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[SIGHTING] Adjectival Nabokov & style
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Mike Marcus replies:
Curtal as a noun is not uncommon in early modern literature (as VN knew),
when horses were ubiquitous. Shakespeare uses it in All's Well, and in
Chapman's 'Gentleman Usher' the word occurs three times in the first few
lines of the play, in Poggio's dream.
Incidentally, bow-leggedness is also a typical theme in early modern
comedy. It was characteristic of venereal disease, the "French pox", such
that the sufferer walked "tressel-legged" (as toward the end of Chapman's
'Widow's Tears').
The color gray (VN's "gray car" and "grayness") also seemed to have some
symbolic significance for early modern writers (Shakespeare & Jonson
especially) but I don't know what it was.
MM
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Curtal as a noun is not uncommon in early modern literature (as VN knew),
when horses were ubiquitous. Shakespeare uses it in All's Well, and in
Chapman's 'Gentleman Usher' the word occurs three times in the first few
lines of the play, in Poggio's dream.
Incidentally, bow-leggedness is also a typical theme in early modern
comedy. It was characteristic of venereal disease, the "French pox", such
that the sufferer walked "tressel-legged" (as toward the end of Chapman's
'Widow's Tears').
The color gray (VN's "gray car" and "grayness") also seemed to have some
symbolic significance for early modern writers (Shakespeare & Jonson
especially) but I don't know what it was.
MM
Search archive with Google:
http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=site:listserv.ucsb.edu&HL=en
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Visit "Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
Manage subscription options: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/