Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

Describing his last visit to one last Villa Venus, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) quotes the bawd's words ‘Smorchiama la secandela’ (let us snuff out the candle):

According to Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969), all the hundred floramors (palatial brothels built by David van Veen, a wealthy architect of Flemish extraction, all over the world in memory of his grandson Eric, the author of an essay entitled 'Villa Venus: an Organized Dream') opened simultaneously on September 20, 1875:

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) quotes Shade's poem "The Nature of Electricity" and says that science tells us that the Earth would not merely fall apart, but vanish like a ghost, if Electricity were suddenly removed from the world:

In Canto Four of his poem Pale Fire John Shade (the poet in VN's novel Pale Fire, 1962) describes shaving and mentions sunglassers touring Beirut (the capital of Lebanon):

Describing his rented house, 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 his landlord’s four daughters (Alphina, Betty, Candida and Dee):

Describing his rented house, 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 his landlord’s four daughters (Alphina, Betty, Candida and Dee):

The three main characters in VN's novel Pale Fire (1962) are the poet Shade, his commentator Kinbote (who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla) and his murderer Gradus. Shade's poem is written in heroic couplets. In his commentary Kinbote says that Shade embowers his muse between the two masters of the heroic couplet (Oliver Goldsmith, 1728-74, and William Wordsworth, 1770-1850):

Lines 47-48: the frame house between Goldsworth and Wordsmith 

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), Zemblan boy choirs are the sweetest in the world:

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), the most striking characteristic of Shade's obituary written by Professor Hurley (the head of the English Department at Wordsmith University) is that it contains not one reference to the glorious friendship that brightened the last months of Shade's life:

Describing his visit to his wife's Villa Disa near Nice, 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 two Soviet generals who had just been attached to the Extremist government as Foreign Advisers: