Subject
Re: University Poem
From
Date
Body
On 23/05/2012 19:32, "Jay Livingston" <livingstonj@MAIL.MONTCLAIR.EDU>
wrote:
> Written in 1926 but translated only recently, it seems, by DN. In the
> London Review of Books (here
> <http://www.lrb.co.uk/2012/05/23/vladimir-nabokov/the-university-poem> ).
> ------
>
> Thanks, Jay. I do subscribe to the LRB (London Review of Books) but that issue
> has not yet reached me. Some VN-listers may not know that the LRB is by far
> the most lefty-pinko¹ of the main literary journals, but, as an ex-Stalinist,
> I find it intriguing to see the emerging spectra of neo-Red, supplementing my
> other two regular deliveries (Times Literary Supplement and New York Review of
> Books).
The poem does not directly name the university townlet¹ (sic) as Cambridge,
but every detail of architecture, fauna, and college life is unmistakably
Cantabrigian beyond the bounds of student cliché. Nabokov¹s general disdain
for his Cambridge years emerges in overplus, a flaw we Cantabrigian
Nabokovians have learned to shrug off. Nobody (recall VN¹s misreading of his
own name?!) is perfect.
I really hope the original 1926 Russian text survives. And, if it does, we
urgently seek prosodic and bio analysis with better translations. Are you
reading this, esteemed Victor Fet? The Russian can¹t possibly be as
UNPOLISHED as Dmitri¹s apparently DRAFT, over-literal rendition (on a CIA
plane to Libya?). In spite of which, many gemlets [sic] shine through.
The attraction of female tennis players¹ limbs, for example, reminds one of
Betjeman at his guilty, British best. Then come couplets with all the
cloth-eared bathos of John Shade at his worst (thanks to VN¹s sublime gifts
of parody ;=))
I crammed with textbooks through the night,
with ice against my brow pressed tight.
Whenever DN translated it (any clues on this?), he was clearly confused at
the time over basic university terminology, suggesting that VN did NOT get
round to editing or approving this translation.
We find capes¹ rather than gowns¹ (the origin of the well-known Oxbridge
Town-Gown dichotomy), and a parenthetical gloss over college headwear where
mortarboard¹ is intended. It would be interesting to see VN¹s Russian for
these ever-so-Brit items. Bedders,¹ the wonderful college-room cleaning
ladies who DID for us (Can I DO you now, Sir?) are described as crones,¹
which is unbelievably offensive. As are boobs¹ for the elderly ladies VN
encounters at dreary¹ parties.
We do find Bulldog¹ correctly translated, but possibly as an accidental
literal meaning of VN¹s Russian. DN would know Bulldog as the American
derog. slang for police-vigilante man, popularized by Woodie Guthrie in his
hobo* and Wobbly ballads. But it¹s unclear whether DN knew Bulldog as the
ancient student term for the Oxbridge ceremonial semi-cops maintaining the
diverse Proctorial protocols, and authorised to fine you on the spot.
VN escapes their canine clutches when a late date with Violet (another
mystery girl-friend to explore, this one well beyond the age-of-consent)
finds him on the streets after hours unsuitably attired.
There are many biographical plums to pluck, worthy of comparison with other
sources for this period best left to BB and others better informed than
me. The football match, described in Verse 21 with a strange mix of poetic
and journalistic zeal, has VN and Violet as spectators, but no hint at VN¹s
own prowess as a Goalie.
Your average fan: under his cap
a squeamish lip and a strong whiff
of Virginia smoke. But now,
his lips unclench, his pipe¹s withdrawn;
another minute, mouth¹s agape;
another and he is howling. Hands
by the hundreds victory inciting:
an artful player propels the ball,
darts like a swallow the field¹s full length,
two men rush him, he swerves, he breaks through
neat piece of work and, on the run,
nets the tanned ball from afar
with a shot from his well-practiced toe.
VN¹s mild literary misogyny can now be dated as early as 1926:
... some literary lady or
dime-a-dozen poetaster
will bemoan the dances of the past;
Relevant to recent exchanges on VN¹s knowledge & affection for the English
Romantics (including that MONSTROUS [sic] but otherwise missing link from
Lolita¹s Humbert Humbert to Mary Shelley¹s Frankenstein) is VN¹s dismissal
of Byron (a Trinity College student like VN) in favour of Keats.
Clutching his bear from Muscovy,
esteemed the boxer¹s fate,
of Italic beauty dreaming
lame Byron passed his student days.
I remembered his distress
his swim across the Hellespont
to lose some weight.
But I have cooled toward his creations
so do forgive my unromantic side
to me the marble roses of a Keats
have more charm than all those stagey storms.
(Verse 10)
For what it¹s worth, we do know that both Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley
(Mary¹s then 18-year-old lover) were present swapping ghost stories when the
seeds of her Frankenstein plot were sown.
The sudden mysterious appearance of such a long poem (63 verses each of
approx 12 lines) after DN¹s tragic exit suggests to me that DN probably
considered it an unfinished draft unworthy of publication. I¹m sure the
combined VN-list expertise will be quickly ahead of me with helpful
hypotheses.
Stan Kelly-Bootle, MA (Cantab)
* Interestingly, hobo¹ appears in verse 56, describing VN¹s post-Cambridge
travails:
And I, a liberated idler now,
with my free and hungry soul
went soaring off to other shores,
to a familiar port, where in an office
the indifferent sea recruits
simple hoboes such as me.
I have already squandered all my riches:
the well-known abbey¹s portrait
in two copies is all I have left.
Again, knowing VN¹s Russian for hobo¹ would be handy. Is there a gobo¹
matching hero/geroi?¹ Much personal irony here, comparing the changes in
Cambridge entrance opportunities between VN¹s 1920s and mine in the 1940s.
Both periods were dominated by limited, elitist, admission-by-wealth/class,
but post-World-War-Two UK saw the first trickle of working-class admissions
via competitive Open Scholarships/Exhibitions, now rewarded with State
grants to cover the fees.
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/
wrote:
> Written in 1926 but translated only recently, it seems, by DN. In the
> London Review of Books (here
> <http://www.lrb.co.uk/2012/05/23/vladimir-nabokov/the-university-poem> ).
> ------
>
> Thanks, Jay. I do subscribe to the LRB (London Review of Books) but that issue
> has not yet reached me. Some VN-listers may not know that the LRB is by far
> the most lefty-pinko¹ of the main literary journals, but, as an ex-Stalinist,
> I find it intriguing to see the emerging spectra of neo-Red, supplementing my
> other two regular deliveries (Times Literary Supplement and New York Review of
> Books).
The poem does not directly name the university townlet¹ (sic) as Cambridge,
but every detail of architecture, fauna, and college life is unmistakably
Cantabrigian beyond the bounds of student cliché. Nabokov¹s general disdain
for his Cambridge years emerges in overplus, a flaw we Cantabrigian
Nabokovians have learned to shrug off. Nobody (recall VN¹s misreading of his
own name?!) is perfect.
I really hope the original 1926 Russian text survives. And, if it does, we
urgently seek prosodic and bio analysis with better translations. Are you
reading this, esteemed Victor Fet? The Russian can¹t possibly be as
UNPOLISHED as Dmitri¹s apparently DRAFT, over-literal rendition (on a CIA
plane to Libya?). In spite of which, many gemlets [sic] shine through.
The attraction of female tennis players¹ limbs, for example, reminds one of
Betjeman at his guilty, British best. Then come couplets with all the
cloth-eared bathos of John Shade at his worst (thanks to VN¹s sublime gifts
of parody ;=))
I crammed with textbooks through the night,
with ice against my brow pressed tight.
Whenever DN translated it (any clues on this?), he was clearly confused at
the time over basic university terminology, suggesting that VN did NOT get
round to editing or approving this translation.
We find capes¹ rather than gowns¹ (the origin of the well-known Oxbridge
Town-Gown dichotomy), and a parenthetical gloss over college headwear where
mortarboard¹ is intended. It would be interesting to see VN¹s Russian for
these ever-so-Brit items. Bedders,¹ the wonderful college-room cleaning
ladies who DID for us (Can I DO you now, Sir?) are described as crones,¹
which is unbelievably offensive. As are boobs¹ for the elderly ladies VN
encounters at dreary¹ parties.
We do find Bulldog¹ correctly translated, but possibly as an accidental
literal meaning of VN¹s Russian. DN would know Bulldog as the American
derog. slang for police-vigilante man, popularized by Woodie Guthrie in his
hobo* and Wobbly ballads. But it¹s unclear whether DN knew Bulldog as the
ancient student term for the Oxbridge ceremonial semi-cops maintaining the
diverse Proctorial protocols, and authorised to fine you on the spot.
VN escapes their canine clutches when a late date with Violet (another
mystery girl-friend to explore, this one well beyond the age-of-consent)
finds him on the streets after hours unsuitably attired.
There are many biographical plums to pluck, worthy of comparison with other
sources for this period best left to BB and others better informed than
me. The football match, described in Verse 21 with a strange mix of poetic
and journalistic zeal, has VN and Violet as spectators, but no hint at VN¹s
own prowess as a Goalie.
Your average fan: under his cap
a squeamish lip and a strong whiff
of Virginia smoke. But now,
his lips unclench, his pipe¹s withdrawn;
another minute, mouth¹s agape;
another and he is howling. Hands
by the hundreds victory inciting:
an artful player propels the ball,
darts like a swallow the field¹s full length,
two men rush him, he swerves, he breaks through
neat piece of work and, on the run,
nets the tanned ball from afar
with a shot from his well-practiced toe.
VN¹s mild literary misogyny can now be dated as early as 1926:
... some literary lady or
dime-a-dozen poetaster
will bemoan the dances of the past;
Relevant to recent exchanges on VN¹s knowledge & affection for the English
Romantics (including that MONSTROUS [sic] but otherwise missing link from
Lolita¹s Humbert Humbert to Mary Shelley¹s Frankenstein) is VN¹s dismissal
of Byron (a Trinity College student like VN) in favour of Keats.
Clutching his bear from Muscovy,
esteemed the boxer¹s fate,
of Italic beauty dreaming
lame Byron passed his student days.
I remembered his distress
his swim across the Hellespont
to lose some weight.
But I have cooled toward his creations
so do forgive my unromantic side
to me the marble roses of a Keats
have more charm than all those stagey storms.
(Verse 10)
For what it¹s worth, we do know that both Byron and Percy Bysshe Shelley
(Mary¹s then 18-year-old lover) were present swapping ghost stories when the
seeds of her Frankenstein plot were sown.
The sudden mysterious appearance of such a long poem (63 verses each of
approx 12 lines) after DN¹s tragic exit suggests to me that DN probably
considered it an unfinished draft unworthy of publication. I¹m sure the
combined VN-list expertise will be quickly ahead of me with helpful
hypotheses.
Stan Kelly-Bootle, MA (Cantab)
* Interestingly, hobo¹ appears in verse 56, describing VN¹s post-Cambridge
travails:
And I, a liberated idler now,
with my free and hungry soul
went soaring off to other shores,
to a familiar port, where in an office
the indifferent sea recruits
simple hoboes such as me.
I have already squandered all my riches:
the well-known abbey¹s portrait
in two copies is all I have left.
Again, knowing VN¹s Russian for hobo¹ would be handy. Is there a gobo¹
matching hero/geroi?¹ Much personal irony here, comparing the changes in
Cambridge entrance opportunities between VN¹s 1920s and mine in the 1940s.
Both periods were dominated by limited, elitist, admission-by-wealth/class,
but post-World-War-Two UK saw the first trickle of working-class admissions
via competitive Open Scholarships/Exhibitions, now rewarded with State
grants to cover the fees.
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/