Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

According to 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), Shade’s mother assisted her husband in his work and drew the admirable figures of his Birds of Mexico:

In his Commentary and Index 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) mentions Queen Disa’s cousin, Harfar Baron of Shalksbore, who was nicknamed Curdy Buff by his admirers:

Describing the king’s escape from Zembla, 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) mentions matted elfinwood:

Describing the king’s escape from Zembla, 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) mentions lazy Garh, the farmer's daughter who shows to the king the shortest way to the pass:

In VN’s novel Ada (1969) Van Veen calls himself, his sister Ada his half-sister Lucette “the children of Venus:”

Describing his novel Letters from Terra (1892), Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions Flora, Professor Leyman’s assistant:

According to Kinbote (Shade’s mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla), he can enumerate only a few trees in the so-called Shakespeare Avenue at the campus of Wordsmith University:

At the end of his poem John Shade (the poet in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962) mentions some neighbor's gardener:

And through the flowing shade and ebbing light

A man, unheedful of the butterfly -

Some neighbor's gardener, I guess - goes by

Trundling an empty barrow up the lane. (ll. 996-999)

Having struck this out, the poet tried another theme, but these lines he also canceled:

England where poets flew the highest, now

Wants them to plod and Pegasus to plough;

Now the prosemongers of the Grubby Group,

The Message Man, the owlish Nincompoop

And all the Social Novels of our age

Leave but a pinch of coal dust on the page. (note to Line 922)

According to 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), Shade’s heart attack almost coincided with the disguised king's arrival in America: