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[NABOKOV-L] The two Lucrezias: Ada and poisons
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Acqua Toffana (or Aqua Tofana) is not related to Lucrezia Borgia* and, needless to add, to the other Lucrezia.** It makes its appearance right at the start of "Ada," in connection to Dolly (Daria Zemski, married to Ivan Durmanov), not necessarily to her daughter, Aqua.***
"...Dolly had inherited her mother's beauty and temper but also an older ancestral strain of whimsical, and not seldom deplorable, taste, well reflected, for instance, in the names she gave her daughters: Aqua and Marina ('Why not Tofana?' wondered the good and sur-royally antlered general...)
There are hints that Ada poisoned Krolik, and her lover Rack before Van got to him.# ( I'm only superficially aware of this hypothesis, ellaborated by Carolyn Kunin in past N-L postings).
In Mlle Larivière's "The Young and the Damned"describes a pair of twins adept to poisons. The word "colline" serves not only to indicate the opera "La Bohème" but, perhaps, to one of the components of "belladona." (acetylcholine) ##
Is there any role played by the maid Blanche (La Tourbière and Torfyanuyu) in the poisonings? "torfyanuyu" and "tofana"?###
* "...even Popes and their children have been involved in notorious poisonings. The most famous case is of the 15th and 16th century family of Borgias which flourished in Italy. The most notorious poisoners of this family were Cesare Borgia (1476-1507) and Lucrezia Borgia (1480-1519) who dispatched several of their rivals with a secret poison, then known as "La Cantarella". Their name is so inseparable with 15th and 16th century Italy, that whenever there is a mention of this time and location, the name of Borgias immediately springs to one's mind. Most people associate them with murder-by-poison plots. They were the illegitimate son and daughter of one Rodrigo Lenzuoli Borgia (1431-1503), who went on to become Pope Alexander VI from 1492 onwards till his death. He is said to have had five children by his mistress Vanozza de Cattanei, out of which two - Cesare and Lucrezia - proved to be most notorious. La Cantarella, often known as "the poison of the Borgias", was a secret poison and no one seems to know its composition today, but it most probably was a mixture of subacetate of copper, arsenic and crude phosphorus..."
** Lucrezia de' Medici (14 February 1545 - 21 April 1561)was the daughter of Cosimo I de' Medici and Eleanor of Toledo.
Born in Florence, she was the first wife of Alfonso II d'Este, Duke of Modena and Ferrara, whom she married on 3 July 1558. She moved to Ferrara only two years later, after being abandoned by her husband, who preferred the court of Henry II of France. Her sudden death spurred rumours that she was poisoned, but it is more likely that she instead died of tuberculosis..After the ground-breaking book of Louis S. Friedland of 1936, experts claim she is the Duchess on the painting referred to in Robert Browning's poem My Last Duchess. (wiki)
*** "Van's maternal grandmother Daria ('Dolly') Durmanov was the daughter of Prince Peter Zemski, Governor of Bras d'Or...who had married, in 1824, Mary O'Reilly, an Irish woman of fashion. Dolly, an only child,...(married)at the tender and wayward age of fifteen, General Ivan Durmanov..."
# (Rack)..."Ward Five was where hopeless cases were kept...a poison had seeped into his system; the local 'lab' could not identify it and they were now waiting for a report..."
##"Mlle Larivière's Enfants Maudits (1887) finally degenerated! She had had two adolescents, in a French castle, poison their widowed mother who had seduced a young neighbor, the lover of one of her twins...G.A. Vronsky, had told her (Ada) she was always pretty enough to serve one day as a stand-in for Lenore Colline."..
### "...Ada, with a deep sigh of pleasure, composed: the adjective TORFYaNUYu which went through a brown square at F and through two red squares (37 x 9 = 333 points) and got a bonus...(and) she recounted her monstrous points in a smug, melodious tone of voice like a princess narrating the poison-cup killing of a superfluous lover..."
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"...Dolly had inherited her mother's beauty and temper but also an older ancestral strain of whimsical, and not seldom deplorable, taste, well reflected, for instance, in the names she gave her daughters: Aqua and Marina ('Why not Tofana?' wondered the good and sur-royally antlered general...)
There are hints that Ada poisoned Krolik, and her lover Rack before Van got to him.# ( I'm only superficially aware of this hypothesis, ellaborated by Carolyn Kunin in past N-L postings).
In Mlle Larivière's "The Young and the Damned"describes a pair of twins adept to poisons. The word "colline" serves not only to indicate the opera "La Bohème" but, perhaps, to one of the components of "belladona." (acetylcholine) ##
Is there any role played by the maid Blanche (La Tourbière and Torfyanuyu) in the poisonings? "torfyanuyu" and "tofana"?###
* "...even Popes and their children have been involved in notorious poisonings. The most famous case is of the 15th and 16th century family of Borgias which flourished in Italy. The most notorious poisoners of this family were Cesare Borgia (1476-1507) and Lucrezia Borgia (1480-1519) who dispatched several of their rivals with a secret poison, then known as "La Cantarella". Their name is so inseparable with 15th and 16th century Italy, that whenever there is a mention of this time and location, the name of Borgias immediately springs to one's mind. Most people associate them with murder-by-poison plots. They were the illegitimate son and daughter of one Rodrigo Lenzuoli Borgia (1431-1503), who went on to become Pope Alexander VI from 1492 onwards till his death. He is said to have had five children by his mistress Vanozza de Cattanei, out of which two - Cesare and Lucrezia - proved to be most notorious. La Cantarella, often known as "the poison of the Borgias", was a secret poison and no one seems to know its composition today, but it most probably was a mixture of subacetate of copper, arsenic and crude phosphorus..."
** Lucrezia de' Medici (14 February 1545 - 21 April 1561)was the daughter of Cosimo I de' Medici and Eleanor of Toledo.
Born in Florence, she was the first wife of Alfonso II d'Este, Duke of Modena and Ferrara, whom she married on 3 July 1558. She moved to Ferrara only two years later, after being abandoned by her husband, who preferred the court of Henry II of France. Her sudden death spurred rumours that she was poisoned, but it is more likely that she instead died of tuberculosis..After the ground-breaking book of Louis S. Friedland of 1936, experts claim she is the Duchess on the painting referred to in Robert Browning's poem My Last Duchess. (wiki)
*** "Van's maternal grandmother Daria ('Dolly') Durmanov was the daughter of Prince Peter Zemski, Governor of Bras d'Or...who had married, in 1824, Mary O'Reilly, an Irish woman of fashion. Dolly, an only child,...(married)at the tender and wayward age of fifteen, General Ivan Durmanov..."
# (Rack)..."Ward Five was where hopeless cases were kept...a poison had seeped into his system; the local 'lab' could not identify it and they were now waiting for a report..."
##"Mlle Larivière's Enfants Maudits (1887) finally degenerated! She had had two adolescents, in a French castle, poison their widowed mother who had seduced a young neighbor, the lover of one of her twins...G.A. Vronsky, had told her (Ada) she was always pretty enough to serve one day as a stand-in for Lenore Colline."..
### "...Ada, with a deep sigh of pleasure, composed: the adjective TORFYaNUYu which went through a brown square at F and through two red squares (37 x 9 = 333 points) and got a bonus...(and) she recounted her monstrous points in a smug, melodious tone of voice like a princess narrating the poison-cup killing of a superfluous lover..."
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/