-------- Original Message --------
Carolyn/ED: indeed, Martin Gardner is a _household_ name to all
mathematicians, although he always modestly rules himself out of the
category of "real" mathematician, being content to be justly famed for
his prolific deeds in the branch of math known as "recreational." It's
not easy for "outsiders" to appreciate the shifting gap, since many a
playful notion, such as removing your waistcoat without first removing
your jacket (ditto, no offense, shedding your knickers if your
shoelaces are tied together) turns out to have deep topological
implications!
The mutual admiration 'twixt VN and MG is hardly surprising given
their love of puzzles, word-play; after-life speculation (MG has a
strange chapter in one of
his memoirs, I recall, claiming a belief in life-after-death that was
not incompatible with his agnosticism-bordering-on-atheism); Lewis
Carroll (as well as annotating Alice, MG also wrote a wonderfully
annotated Hunting of the Snark). Where VN might diverge from MG
mathematically is in the oft-debated "dichotomy" between the
"particular" and the "general." MG was more aware than VN that "real"
mathematics _starts_ when all those amusing tricks with Pascal
Triangles and Fibonacci Series turn out to be particular cases of much
more magical "higher" abstractions.
MG doesn't appear in the index of "VN Selected Letters, 1940-1977" but
I _have_ found a rare error in that index! The entry 'Pale Fire p 322'
sends you to a page 322 that has no such mention of PF! Was a ghostly
Kinbote at work while Dmitri was pre-occupied? I would love to see any
extant mail between VN and MG, and will explore the refs. given. As
you'll see anon, MG gets a direct mention in Ada! There's added
immortality!
Dare I mention that I once wrote to MG pointing out an error in his
description of the Turing Machine? Shortly after that article in
American Scientist, he was
replaced by the Hoffstadter (sp?) of Bach/Go:del/GoldenBraid fame, who
proved a poor substitute. Not until my former colleague Ian Stewart
FRS took over, did AmSci find a genuine "real" mathematician-columnist
with MG's "recreational" prowess.
The email below is a tad ambiguous, CK. Was your located tidbit the following
para starting "EDNOTE ..." or is that a current EDNOTE commenting on your
finds?
The exchanges between VN and MG, recounted in Brian Boyd's VN-TAY,
page 465 (and presumably explored further in the refs. below) is most
amusing.
"This increasingly depressing ritual [a spate of mis-ascribing quotes
to VN, e.g., some said Mary McCarthy was really a VN pseudonym!] was
redeemed only by Nabokov fan Martin Gardner, who in his 'Ambidextrous
Universe' attributed the poem 'Pale Fire' solely to John Shade, as if
Nabokov never existed. In 'Ada,' Nabokov returned the compliment:
'Space is swarming in the eyes, and Time a singing in the eyes,' says
John Shade, a modern poet, as quoted by an invented philosopher
('Martin Gardner') the 'Ambidextrous Universe,' page 165."
(Ada, p 542)
There no sign in these snippets that MG's playful ref. to John Shade
as the sole living author of the Cantos can be construed as MG
supporting a Shade-as-Kinbote author of the Commentaries. Perhaps
elsewhere MG advanced such claims?
Again: pardons begged from those over-familiar with the above.
skb