Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

In a conversation at the Faculty Club 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 kinbote means in Zemblan "a king's destroyer" and longs to explain that a king who sinks his identity in the mirror of exile is in a sense just that:

Professor Pardon now spoke to me: "I was under the impression that you were born in Russia, and that your name was a kind of anagram of Botkin or Botkine?"

In 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 exile becomes a bad habit:

Line 998: Some neighbor's gardener

When Van and Ada climb the shattal tree (the Tree of Knowledge that grows at Ardis), Ada mentions l’ardeur de la canicule (the extreme heat of summer):

Describing his first physical contact with Ada, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Ada, 1969) calls the shattal tree (the Tree of Knowledge that grows at Ardis) "that dappled tree:"

Describing his lovemaking with Ada in "Ardis the First," Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Ada, 1969) mentions Robert Brown's poem "Peter and Margaret" that he made Lucette (Van's and Ada's half-sister) learn by heart:

They tried all sorts of other tricks.

In VN’s novel Priglashenie na kazn’ (“Invitation to a Beheading,” 1935) someone draws the attention of other citizens to the fact that Cincinnatus is not transparent and uses a strange, almost forgotten word:

Describing his meeting with Lucette (Van’s and Ada’s half-sister) in 1901 in Paris, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions the optical mist and calls it "Space's recent revenge:"

Describing Ada's dramatic career, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Ada, 1969) mentions Dawn de Laire, an actress of the Yakima Academy of Drama who played Natasha (Andrey Prozorov's wife) in a somewhat abridged stage version of Four Sisters (as Chekhov’s play The Three Sisters, 1901, is known on Demonia, aka Antiterra, Earth's twin planet on which Ada is set):

Describing his visit to Brownhill (Ada's school for girls), Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Ada, 1969) mentions soft-toned Miss Cleft, the headmistress:

About to leave Van's Manhattan flat, Demon Veen (in VN’s novel Ada, 1969, Van's and Ada's father) asks Van to give him his gloves and cloak:

‘My gloves! Cloak! Thank you. Can I use your W.C.? No? All right. I’ll find one elsewhere. Come over as soon as you can, and we’ll meet Marina at the airport around four and then whizz to the wake, and —’