Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

In his poem “The Nature of Electricity” quoted by Kinbote (Shade’s mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla) in his commentary to Shade's poem John Shade (the poet in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962) mentions Shelley’s incandescent soul that lures the pale moths of starless nights:

After the patio party in "Ardis the Second" Lucette (in VN’s novel Ada, 1969, Van's and Ada's half-sister) stops to examine a bunch of pink mushrooms on a tree stump, and Van says: "Double take, double exposure:"

Before the family dinner in "Ardis the Second" Demon Veen (in VN's novel Ada, 1969, Van's and Ada's father) tells Ada that, when he saw her last time, she simply reeked of some arsenic stuff after seeing her dentist:

Here Ada herself came running into the room. Yes-yes-yes-yes, here I come. Beaming!

Describing the beginning of his lifelong romance with Ada, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions Ada's drawing teacher, Miss Wintergreen, and Paul G. Gigment, the painter whom Ada calls 'Pig Pigment:'

Describing the beginning of his lifelong romance with Ada, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Ada, 1969) mentions the Tree of Knowledge that grows in Ardis:

In a Manhattan bookshop Cordula de Prey (in VN's novel Ada, 1969, Ada's schoolmate at Brownhill) tells Van that she does not date the hoodlums:

At the end of VN's novel Lolita (1955) Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character) mentions prophetic sonnets:

At the beginning of VN's novel Ada (1969) Van Veen (the narrator and main character) speaks of his ancestors and mentions Macedonian and Bavarian settlers who enjoy a halcyon climate under the American Stars and Stripes:

According to Eva Rosen (in VN's novel Lolita, 1955, Lolita's friend at Beardsley), it is better to die than hear Milton Pinski talk about music:

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 the atmosphere of damnum infectum in which he was supposed to dwell: