Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

Describing Flavita (the Russian Scrabble), Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions the Gritz and Venezia Rossa:

After Van’s first night in “Ardis the Second” Ada asks him if he slept his fill:

They stayed on and on, quite unable to part, knowing any explanation would do if anybody wondered why their rooms had remained empty till dawn. The first ray of the morning dabbed a toolbox with fresh green paint, when, at last moved by hunger, they got up and quietly repaired to the pantry.

In his Foreword 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) compares himself to a soft, clumsy giant:

Revisiting Ramsdale in September 1952, Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Lolita, 1955) has an appointment with Mr. Windmuller, the lawyer:

According to John Ray, Jr. (in VN’s novel Lolita, 1955, the author of the Foreword to Humbert Humbert’s manuscript), Rita (the girl with whom Humbert lives after Lolita was abducted from him) has recently married the proprietor of a hotel in Florida:

Describing his life with Rita, Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Lolita, 1955) mentions Rita’s brother, the mayor and boaster of Grainball:

Describing IPH (a lay Institute of Preparation for the Hereafter) in Canto Three of his poem, John Shade (the poet in VN's novel Pale Fire, 1962) mentions l’if, lifeless tree, grand potato and Yewshade:

L'if, lifeless tree! Your great Maybe, Rabelais:

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:

In his essay The Texture of Time (1922) Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions Alice in the Camera Obscura, a book that was given to him on his eighth birthday:

On Demonia (aka Antiterra, Earth’s twin planet on which Ada is set) Pasternak’s novel Doctor Zhivago (1957) is known as Les Amours du Docteur Mertvago, a mystical romance by a pastor: