It's great to be able to get expert ( a biologist poet) corrections or accretions. You wrote that

"Partenocissus is a Latin name for creepers -- ivies of grape family (Vitaceae), of Asian and North American origin.

In Russian it is called "devichii vinograd" (maiden's grape), which is of course a connection both to maidens (or virginity) and Gradus!".

So, independently of its being, as Jerry Friedman pointed out either a "Virginia Creeper, /Parthenocissus quinquefolia/" or "Boston Ivy", /Parthenocissus tricuspidata/", I understand that the "kiss" becomes "vinograd" in Russian.
Perhaps the "virginal maid" accompanyment could not be avoided by Nabokov and it came as a special bonus, i.e., as something that anyone may interpret according to his particular sense of humor without distorting the main picture.

In short, Wordsmith's Main Hall was initially "Vinogradus" and later it became "Shade Hall".

Without having encountered a direct play on possible "tripartite" characters in Kinbote's "Parthenocissus" reference, the metamorphosis it revealed was already striking enough - and we shouldn't forget that, anyway, we only have the third party's description for this.

Your answer to Stan K-B was to the point. He asked: "Is it fanciful to suppose VN was familiar with such wordplay?" and you wrote: "He had to be, because he translated 'Alice in Wonderland' !" and the examples you added were not only delightfully informative but sufficiently ironic to convey your cautionary words - without skipping the fun.

Thank you.
Jansy

----- Original Message -----

From: Fet, Victor

Sent: Friday, August 11, 2006 3:03 PM

Subject: Re: [NABOKV-L] pruning dates

Partenocissus is a Latin name for creepers -- ivies of grape family (Vitaceae), of Asian and North American origin.

In Russian it is called "devichii vinograd" (maiden's grape), which is of course a connection both to maidens (or virginity) and Gradus!

It has been introduced in Russia as decorative ivy since 17th century, and some species are very cold-tolerant.

And, to be sure, "Parthenocissus species are used as food plants by the larvae of some Lepidoptera species including Brown-tail and The Gothic." (Wikipedia)

I couldn't agree with you more - although I had not realized that the ' "Oh sure," with which Shade accompanies his remark about having words perform like trained fleas was meant to be deflating' .

Indeed, no writer has "ability to rule absolutely over language" , inspite of all his training with rethorical devices and rhyme. Perhaps I was only voicing the feeling that Nabokov has the ability to turn ME into a circus flea when I consider his stelar words.

Take "Parthenocissus", for example, the name of the Main Hall at Wordsmith, later named after Shade ( or so Kinbote tells us). A first reading sugested something related to virgin birth and Narcissus. Then I decided to check if "cissus" had any relation to what in Latin is "cindere" ( or something similiar to this), that means " to split", "bissect". It would be just wonderful if right at the begining of Kinbote's comments he were to mention two or even a tripartite character. Then I found out that "cissus" comes from the Greek "kissos" and means... ivy!

Now I can imagine that Shade Hall has ivy-covered walls surrounding "virginal scholars". But the ivy is also used to represent a reference to a kind of "spiral" ( like the helicoid steps we find leading to the library turret ) and gets novel exciting meanings in maths that I'm unable to follow.

How about that for a performing flea, though?