Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

According to Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969), his tutor Andrey Andreevich Aksakov (AAA) blew his fat red nose, when shown the peasant-bare footprint of Tolstoy preserved in the clay of a motor court in Utah:

Describing his life with Cordula de Prey in Cordula’s Manhattan flat, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) compares his work on his first novel Letters from Terra to pregnancy and childbearing:

Trying to remember his family name, Vadim Vadimovich (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Look at the Harlequins!, 1974) wonders if his surname is Nebesnyy:

Before the family dinner in “Ardis the Second” Ada (the title character of a novel, 1969, by VN) mentions a delicate little birthwort (the unfortunate plant that, according to Van, used to be considered by the ancient inhabitants of the Ladore region not so much as a remedy for the bite of a reptile, as the token of a very young woman’s easy delivery):

Before the family dinner in “Ardis the Second” Ada (the title character of a novel, 1969, by VN) mentions “the snake of rhyme” (a play on Van’s words “for the sake of rhyme”):

The neat interplay of harmonious motions, the candid gayety of family reunions, the never-entangling marionette strings — all this is easier described than imagined.

Describing the torments of poor mad Aqua (the twin sister of Van’s, Ada’s and Lucette’s mother Marina), Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions the Virgin and Venus and calls electricity (banned on Antiterra after the L disaster) “the unmentionable magnetic power:”

Describing the torments of poor mad Aqua (the twin sister of Van’s, Ada’s and Lucette’s mother Marina), Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) says that Aqua saw flying sharks with lateral eyes taking barely one night to carry pilgrims through black ether across an entire continent from dark to shining sea:

Describing his performance in variety shows as Mascodagama, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions the Golden Curtain that separates Tartary (a country that on Demonia, aka Antiterra, Earth’s twin planet on which Ada is set, occupies the territory of the Soviet Russia) from the rest of the world:

When Oks (Osip Lvovich Oksman) shows to Vadim Vadimovich (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Look at the Harlequins!, 1974) his lending library, Vadim recognizes – among the people who have a business meeting there – his friend Morozov and Boyarski (a sycophant of the critic Basilevski):

Describing his life in Paris, Vadim Vadimovich (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Look at the Harlequins!, 1974) mentions Adam Atropovich, the unforgettable leader of the talented, illiterate, intuitive new critics: