DEAR DON (KINDLY POST WITH NO CENSORING,  AND WITH ORIGINAL MESSAGE),

WITH ALL DUE RESPECT TO YOUR MENTION OF SYNESTHESIA IN THE CONTEXT OF MY FATHER'S WORK, I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW WHAT THE HELL MSSRS. GRINSPOON AND BAKALAR MEAN TO INSINUATE BY THE LOCUTION "SOME OF THE SAME PECULIARITIES (IN A LESS DISABLING [ITALICS MINE] FORM)"? IS IT THE LACK OF "SOCIAL" (READ "SOCIALIST") CONSCIOUSNESS MY SENSE OF SMELL PERCEIVES? ARE THESE AUTHORS PERHAPS "RECONSIDERING" ON THE WINGS OF THE SAME MIND-ENHANCING SUBSTANCES THAT FUELED GOOD OLD PROFESSOR LEARY? IS MY INTUITION RIGHT WHEN IT SUGGESTS THAT A PAGE LATER THEY WILL TRY TO BE "FAIR" BY CITING AT LEAST ONE OF THE FOLLOWING NABOKOV WORKS: THE STORY "CLOUD, CASTLE, LAKE," OR  THE NOVELS INVITATION TO A BEHEADING AND BEND SINISTER?  VLADIMIR NABOKOV AND I RELISHED OUR SYNESTHESIA -- IN OUR CASES, COLORED VISION OF LETTERS AND OTHER THINGS, AND COLORED HEARING. IT CAN GIVE ADDED DIMENSIONS TO PERCEPTION AND IMAGINATION WITHOUT CHEMICAL ADDITIVES ,  EVEN IF, AS SOME THEORIZE, IT IS CAUSED BY BENIGN ANOMALIES OF CERTAIN CEREBRAL CIRCUITS. FACED WITH THE STRONGEST POSSIBLE CONDEMNATION OF DESPOTISM -- THAT OF ART -- HOW DARE BAKALAR AND GRINSPOON , WITHOUT A MALEVOLENT GRIN, NEVERTHELESS IMPLY THAT MY FATHER WAS SOME KIND OF AMORAL IDIOT SAVANT? 

DN

-----Original Message-----
From: Sandy Klein [mailto:sk@starcapital.net]
Sent: lundi, 14. juillet 2003 05:14
To: Cangrande@BlueWin.ch
Subject: Fw: Nabokov Mention In _Psychedelic Drugs Reconsidered_


From: D. Barton Johnson [mailto:chtodel@cox.net]
Sent: Sun 7/13/2003 10:05 PM
To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
Cc:
Subject: Fw: Nabokov Mention In _Psychedelic Drugs Reconsidered_



        ----- Original Message -----

         From _PDR_ by Lester Grinspoon and James B. Bakalar (1979)
       
         Comparing VN to the mnemonist in Luria's monograph, "The Mind of a
         Mnemonist:"
       
         "In the writer Vladimir Nabokov, some of the same mental peculiarities (in a
         less disabling form) were accompanied by literary genius. Nabokov's novels
         and memoirs display unusual intensity and precision of visual observation,
         disdain for generalities and abstractions, and almost total visual recall of
         scenes from the distant past. He also confesses to experiencing synesthesia
         and vivid hypnagogic imagery. The gift that proved almost a curse to Luria's
         mnemonist was a blessing to Nabokov." (p.255)
       
        EDNOTE.  Interesting. I wrote about synaesthesia and its possible affect on his writing in the early 70s. Reprinted as chapter I of my _Worlds in Regression: Some Novels of VN"