Dear Alexey, Valley Blondies does not sound remotely like Vlyublyonnost' to me. Slightly closer to Au pres de ma Blonde, but I would definitely not put any money on that one either. Could VN have been thinking of the Valley of the Dolls? There was a book and a movie -apparently not as trashy as it sounds- and probably a song too. Carolyn |
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Vadim's first wife, Iris Black, mispronounces the title of his
Russian poem, Vlyublyonnost' (Being in Love, 1922), as "Valley
Blondies":
"I now have reread your "Valley Blondies"
(vlyublyonnost') a hundred times, both the English for the matter and
the Russian for the music. I think it's an absolutely divine piece."
(1.6)
Chekhov's friend and correspondent Lika Mizinov was a
pretty blonde. In a letter of August 13, 1893, to Lika Chekhov calls her
milaya blondinochka (dear blondie) and invites her to Melikhovo:
Приезжайте, милая блондиночка, поговорим, поссоримся,
помиримся; мне без Вас скучно, и я дал бы пять рублей за возможность поговорить
с Вами хотя бы в продолжение пяти минут... Прите к нам, хорошенькая Лика, и
спойте. (Do visit us, pretty Lika, and sing for us.) Trying to tempt
her, Chekhov tells Lika that yabloki (apples) in his garden have
ripened: У нас поспели яблоки.
In his letters of August 12, 1888, to Kazimir Barantsevich and
Nikolay Leykin Chekhov says that he was enchanted with the Georgian
Military Road:
"I have never in my life seen anything like it. It is not a
road, but unbroken poetry, a wonderful, fantastic story written by Demon in love
with Tamara."
Demon was the society nickname of Vadim's father (2.5),
and Tamara is the title of Vadim's first novel. In his old
age Vadim after an illness forgets his surname and remembers it only with
difficulty:
Yes, I definitely felt my family name
began with an N and bore an odious resemblance to the surname or pseudonym of a
presumably notorious (Notorov? No) Bulgarian, or Babylonian, or, maybe,
Betelgeusian writer with whom scatterbrained émigrés from some other galaxy
constantly confused me; but whether it was somethingon the lines of Nebesnyy or
Nabedrin or Nablidze (Nablidze? Funny) I simply could not tell. I preferred not
to overtax my willpower (go away, Naborcroft) and so gave up trying--or perhaps
it began with a B and the n just clung to it like some desperate parasite?
(Bonidze? Blonsky?--No, that belonged to the BINT business.) Did I have some
princely Caucasian blood? Why had allusions to a Mr. Nabarro, a British
politician, cropped up among the clippings I received from England concerning
the London edition of A Kingdom by the Sea (lovely lilting
title)? Why did Ivor call me "MacNab"? (7.3)
Nablidze and Bonidze are Georgian surnames. Vadim wonders if
he had some princely Caucasian blood. Iris Black is murdered by Wladimir
Blagidze,* alias Starov (1.13). Vadim's benefactor (and real father?),
old Count Starov (an admirer of Vadim's beautiful mother) has a
portrait of Mme de Blagidze:
Miss Vrode-Vorodin, the elderly cousin who
kept house for him [Count Starov], made a timely
entrance and led Iris to an adjacent alcove (illuminated by a resplendent
portrait by Serov, 1896, of the notorious beauty, Mme. de Blagidze, in Caucasian
costume) for a nice cup of tea. (1.10)
Count Starov brings to mind staraya grafinya (old
Countess), a character in Pushkin's story Pikovaya dama (The Queen
of Spades, 1833). Pushkin is the author of two "Georgian"
poems:
Не пой, красавица, при мне
Ты песен Грузии печальной: Напоминают мне оне Другую жизнь и берег дальный... My beauty, do not sing in my presence
The songs of sad Georgia: They remind me of other life and distant shores... and На холмах Грузии лежит
ночная мгла...
The hills of Georgia are covered by the night gloom...
In his poem Kavkaz (The
Caucasus, 1829) Pushkin mentions oryol (eagle) hovering evenly
with him:
Орёл, с отдалённой
поднявшись вершины,
Парит неподвижно со мной
наравне.
Orlov, the name of a Soviet spy who accompanies
Vadim in his trip to Leningrad (Part Five), comes from
oryol.
Pushkin's post scriptum to Alexey Vulf's and
Anna Vulf's letter of September 1, 1827, to Anna Kern (the addressee of
Pushkin's poem Ya pomnyu chudnoe mgnoven'e, I remember a
wondrous moment, 1825) is signed Yablochnyi Pirog (Apple
Pie):
Анна Петровна, я Вам
жалуюсь на Анну Николавну — она меня не целовала в глаза, как Вы изволили
приказывать. Adieu, belle dame.
Весь ваш
Яблочный пирог. Vadim's family name seems to be Yablonski. Voevoda
(Polish governor of Province) Yablonski is mentioned by Pushkin in the
unfinished History of Peter.
Incidentally, it was Griboedov who married a young
Georgian beauty (Princess Nina Chavchavadze) and a few months later was
assassinated in Teheran. In his poem Uchast' russkikh poetov (The
Destiny of Russian Poets, 1845) Kuechelbecker alludes to the deaths of
Pushkin and Griboedov:
Или болезнь наводит ночь и мглу
На очи прозорливцев вдохновенных; Или рука любезников презренных Шлет пулю их священному челу; Или же бунт поднимет чернь глухую,
И чернь того на части разорвёт, Чей блещущий перунами полёт Сияньем о́блил бы страну родную. or sickness overcasts with night and gloom
the eyes of the inspired, the seers!
Or else the hand of some vile's lady man
impels a bullet at their sacred brow;
Or the deaf rabble rises in revolt -
and him the rabble will to pieces tear
whose wingèd course, ablaze with thunderbolts,
might drench in radiance the motherland.
"The bullet killed Pushkin, the rabble murdered Griboedov." (EO Commentary,
II, pp. 446-447)
Chern' (rabble) comes from chyornyi (black). Iris Black
dies on April 23, 1930. It seems that April 23, 1899, is also Vadim's
birthday.
— Да помогите же мне! — кричит он,
топая ногами. — Застрелюсь, чёрт вас возьми! Повешусь!
The lawyer whom Dybkin visits by mistake (the dentist he
needs lives below) has long fair hair:
— Что-с? Что вам угодно? —
спрашивает его хозяин кабинета, длинноволосый блондин в
очках.
Alexey Sklyarenko |