Dear Colleagues,

I am currently doing a new translation of "Pnin" for the Pléiade and often feel that Nabokov is torturing me from wherever he is. I had never had this impression in my previous translations ("Lolita" and the screenplay, "Glory", two volumes of short stories and "The original of Laura", not counting seven books by David Lodge). The language itself, more convoluted and less pure perhaps than in Nabokov's other novels written in English, compels the translator to juggle with both syntax and vocabulary in an unprecedented way. Remember what Nabokov himself said about the difficulty of translating from English into French; but, here, there is something else. I don't know if Gene, Dieter and the other colleagues who translated this novel experienced the same thing; I'd appreciate their comments.

I am also beginning to change my appreciation of this novel. I have written about Nabokov's brand of sadism elsewhere; I almost feel it in my bones as I am translating "Pnin" and it makes me uncomfortable at times. I thought I admired this novel a lot, but I am beginning to wonder if I hadn't misread it. Am I an exception?

Maurice Couturier

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