Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

In Canto One of his poem John Shade (the poet in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962) mentions the svelte stilettos of a frozen stillicide:

All colors made me happy: even gray.

My eyes were such that literally they

Took photographs. Whenever I'd permit,

Or, with a silent shiver, order it,

Whatever in my field of vision dwelt -

In VN’s novel Ada (1969) Ada, showing to Van her larvarium, says: ‘Je raffole de tout ce qui rampe (I’m crazy about everything that crawls):’

‘And now,’ she said, and stopped, staring at him.

‘Yes?’ he said, ‘and now?’

Describing a tremendous stretch of microfilm taken by Uncle Dan during his triple trip round the globe, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions the third male member of the party, a real British brick:

To the words of a professor of physics “History has denounced him [the King of Zembla], and that is his epitaph" Shade (the poet in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962) replies that in due time history will have denounced everybody:

According to Pink (as in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, Kinbote calls a professor of physics who joins in a conversation at the Faculty Club), history has denounced the last King of Zembla, and that is his epitaph:

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), to the King’s question "how long will you be absent" the guard (handsome Hal) replied "yeg ved ik [I know not]:"

In his lecture on dreams Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions El Motela and Ramera (the Moors in Osberg’s novel The Gitanilla):

Describing his courtship of Annette Blagovo, Vadim Vadimovich (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Look at the Harlequins!, 1974) compares Annette’s dreadful parents who asked to see Vadim’s books to a suspicious physician who might ask for a sample of semen:

Describing the family dinner in “Ardis the Second,” Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions the goodness of Demon’s crooked heart:

‘Ah!’ said Demon, tasting Lord Byron’s Hock. ‘This redeems Our Lady’s Tears.’

Describing the family dinner in “Ardis the Second,” Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions Jones, a servant at Ardis who carries two beautiful dragon-entwined flambeaux: