A. Bouazza wrote about "the recent
sciothery or hunt for the waxwing's shadow or, more exactly...",
before recreating the shades of Luzhin's nose creating a kind
of sundial - as precise as if it'd been inspired by
Aqua's moustachioed clock.
He also mentions Proffer's study
that creates a "a
sciotherical list of what he called "sun and shade images" as they occur in
Lolita (and elsewhere), Keys to Lolita, pp. 105-107 (and
121-124)", and indicated pages 105-106 of this book, for the light they
shed on [the] enumeration of VN's tessellate and reticular imagery.
"
There is a wonderful verb in Portuguese for
wings, more specifically, for a bird's movement when closing the wings
before taking a plunge: "siar" and,at first, I entertained
great hopes that, at last, I would find its translation in English. And
yet, although I could not find "sciothery", I still got to
"sciolist" ( a superficial pretender to knowledge, from "sciolous" as
in Pope's "dangerous thing"). Ouch? But thanks for the indication of Proffer's book, for
surface tactile effects in VN are always fascinating.
(Does anyone know if there is a
verb in English for that motion of folding wings, like fluttering
eyelids just closing to hide a shameful thought, as we have
in "siar"?)
I enjoyed Andrew Brown's message about
"Lolita" ( he wrote: "I think it was Beckett who said something to the
effect that nothing is funnier than pain...The kids are okay. Only the
technology and the clothes change; most of us become human beings eventually.
All that’s needed are a fair share of the undeserved beatings that life is so
eager to mete out to everyone, good, bad, or indifferent."), but I wish I
could entertain similar hopes that "the kids are okay". Fortunately some of them might be caught
by Lolita's tesselated words and images and return to the book
when they grow wiser.
Jansy