Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

At the end of his commentary to Shade's poem Kinbote (in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, Shade’s mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla) says that he will continue to exist:

"And you, what will you be doing with yourself, poor King, poor Kinbote?" a gentle young voice may inquire.

In his imaginary dialogue with Koncheyev (the rival poet) Fyodor Konstantinovich Godunov-Cherdyntsev, the narrator and main character in VN's novel Dar ("The Gift," 1937), says that Pushkin is zolotoy fond nashey literatury (the gold reserve of our literature):

"Не трогайте Пушкина: это золотой фонд нашей литературы. А вон там, в Чеховской корзине, провиант на много лет вперед, да щенок, который делает "уюм, уюм, уюм", да бутылка крымского".

In Canto Three of his poem John Shade (the poet in VN's novel Pale Fire, 1962) describes his heart attack that occured during a lecture he gave at the Crashaw Club:

The Crashaw Club had paid me to discuss 

Why Poetry Is Meaningful to Us. 

I gave my sermon, a dull thing but short. 

As I was leaving in some haste, to thwart 

The so-called "question period" at the end, 

In Canto Three of his poem John Shade (the poet in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962) describes his visit to Mrs. Z. who mentioned Shade’s poem about Mon Blon that appeared in the Blue Review:

Describing his first night with Lolita in The Enchanted Hunters (a hotel in Briceland, a small town in New England), Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Lolita, 1955) quotes his uncle Gustave's words sicher ist sicher (better safe than sorry):

In VN’s novel Lolita (1955) Lolita is sent by her mother to Camp Q where she is debauched by Charlie Holmes, the camp-mistress's son:

In the Russian Lolita (1967) the word officer in Humbert's poem "Wanted" composed after Lolita's abduction from (or, more likely, death in) the Elphinstone hospital is rendered as patrul'shchik (patrol man):

Патрульщик, патрульщик, вон там, под дождем,
Где струится ночь, светофорясь...
Она в белых носках, она - сказка моя,
И зовут ее: Гейз, Долорес.
Патрульщик, патрульщик, вон едут они,
Долорес Гейз и мужчина.
Дай газу, вынь кольт, догоняй, догони,
Вылезай, заходи за машину!

As he speaks to Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Lolita, 1955), Clare Quilty mentions Phil who calls Philadelphia and Pat who calls Patagonia:

Among the things that Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Lolita, 1955) and Lolita cannot discuss are stippled Hopkins and shorn Baudelaire:

In an attempt to save his life Clare Quilty (a playwright and pornographer whom Humbert murders for abducting Lolita from the Elphinstone hospital) offers Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Lolita, 1955) to arrange for him to attend executions and tells him that the chair is painted yellow: