While ordering the commentaries I inadvertently used the initials
RG instead of RT to reproduce Rachel Trousdale's sentence [ Shade reads everything to Sybil, and Sybil translates poetry
from English to French. Wouldn't she make sure his "Baudelaire"
was pronounced correctly?]. Please, excuse me Rachel.
Returning to the " Poor old man Swift, poor --, poor
Baudelaire" discussion:
VN wrote in Strong Opinions: "I think it is so nice
that the day on which Kinbote committed suicide ( and he certainly did after
putting the last touches to his edition of the poem) happens to be both the
anniversary of Pushkin's Lyceum and that of "poor old man
Swift" 's death, which is new to me ( but see variant in note to line
231). In common with Pushkin, I am fascinated by fatidic dates" (Vintage,
pages 74/75)
Kinbote noted:Among the names
of celebrated poets, painters, philosophers, etc., known to have become insane
or to have sunk into senile imbecility, we find many suitable ones... Dark,
disturbing thoughts. We can be certain Kinbote considered the
omitted name to be his and this means he perceived he
was insane, as
already pointed out, but it also shows that he hoped he'd have
his sanity re-established in the Strange Other World, unless he should suffer
a re-incarnation*.
Kinbote died in October 19. Why is it
linked to "fatidic events"?
I tried to find other important birthdays and
events for October 19,1959. In the Religious calendar it is the day
when Ivan Ilyich Sergiyev ( Иван Ильич Сергиев) was born. He
was later canonized by the Russian Orthodox Churches and has the second largest
monastery of St. Petersburg dedicated to him as St. John of Kronstadt.
Unfortunately I couldn't handle the search for
old New York Times editions to try and find as interesting information in it as
we got in PF, after joining the narrator and read over Gradus'
shoulders.
* - Isn't the potato a
"tuber"?
line 502: The grand potato....I.P.H, a lay...;
line 559: How to keep sane
in spiral types of space
lines 618/19: Maybe one
finds le grand néant; maybe/ Again one spirals from the tuber's
eye.
CK's comments on line 619[ The pun sprouts ( see line 502) ] seems to indicate that,
but I still cannot see what has "sprouted". Any ideas? Sprouting
goggle-eyed potatoes are scarcely desirable?