Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

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 a large picture of Judge Goldsworth (Kinbote's landlord who resembles a Medusa-locked hag) and his wife (who resembles Malenkov):

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

At the end of his short 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 "the torments of a Tamerlane, the roar of tyrants torn in hell:"

In his autobiography Speak, Memory (1951) VN describes his life in Berlin in the 1920s and in Paris in the late 1930s and compares Sirin (VN’s Russian nom de plume) to a meteor that passed across the dark sky of exile and disappeared, leaving nothing much else behind him than a vague sense of uneasiness:

In his last letter to his publisher Mr. R., the writer in VN's novel Transparent Things (1972), calls his secretary, Mr. Tamworth, "Tom Tam:" 

Dear Phil,

This, no doubt, is my last letter to you. I am leaving you. I am leaving you for another even greater Publisher. In that House I shall be proofread by cherubim – or misprinted by devils, depending on the department my poor soul is assigned to. So adieu, dear friend, and may your heir auction this off most profitably.

Describing his failed visit to Villa Venus (Eric Veen's floramors), Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) metnions peripatetic Russian newspaper readers slowing down to a trance stop and then strolling again behind their wide open Estotskiya Vesti:

At the picnic on Ada's twelfth birthday Marina (in VN's novel Ada, 1969, Van's, Ada's and Lucette's mother) calls her husband, Daniel Veen (Lucette's father), ‘bednyachok (poor, poor little man):'

Describing the beginning of his life-long romance with Ada, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions Pig Pigment (as Ada calls Paul G. Gigment, the painter):

When Ada (now married to Andrey Vinelander) refuses to leave her sick husband, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) calls her ‘Helen of Troy, Ada of Ardis:'

Describing the beginning of his life-long romance with Ada, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions Pig Pigment (as Ada calls Paul G. Gigment, a painter):

During Van's first tea party at Ardis Marina (in VN's novel Ada, 1969, Van's, Ada's and Lucette's mother) says that Dostoevski loved tea with raspberry syrup: