Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

The characters in VN’s novel Podvig (“Glory,” 1932”) include Darwin, Martin Edelweiss's best friend and rival at Cambridge, and the distinguished scholar Archibald Moon (the author of a book on Russia):

In his commentary and index 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) mentions Uran the Last, the Emperor of Zembla who seems to correspond to Paul I (1754-1801, reigned in 1796-1801):

In his commentary and index 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) mentions Iris Acht, a celebrated actress, favorite of Thurgus the Third (grandfather of Charles the Beloved):

The characters in VN's novel Dar ("The Gift," 1937) include Christopher Mortus, a hostile literary critic who reviewed Fyodor's book Zhizn' Chernyshevskogo ("The Life of Chernyshevski"):

Почти одновременно с этой увеселительной рецензией, появился отзыв Христофора Мортуса (Париж), -- так возмутивший Зину, что с тех пор у нее таращились глаза и напрягались ноздри всякий раз, как упоминалось это имя.

A character in VN's novel Lolita (1955), Gaston Godin (Humbert Humbert's friend and chess partner at Beardsley), eventually gets involved in a sale histoire, in Naples of all places:

In VN's novel Pale Fire (1962) one of Kinbote's notes to Shade's poem ends with a rather anti-Darwinian aphorism, "the one who kills is always his victim's inferior:"

Line 596: Points at the puddle in his basement room

In Canto One of his poem John Shade (the poet in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962) describes his childhood and calls icicles "the svelte stilettos of a frozen stillicide" and "trophies of the eaves:"

All colors made me happy: even gray.

My eyes were such that literally they

Took photographs. Whenever I'd permit,

Or, with a silent shiver, order it,

Whatever in my field of vision dwelt -

An indoor scene, hickory leaves, the svelte

Stilettos of a frozen stillicide -

At the beginning of Canto Four of his poem John Shade (the poet in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962) says that now he will spy on beauty as none has spied on it yet:

Now I shall spy on beauty as none has

Spied on it yet. Now I shall cry out as

None has cried out. Now I shall try what none

Has tried. Now I shall do what none has done.

And speaking of this wonderful machine:

I'm puzzled by the difference between

Two methods of composing: A, the kind

The narrator and main character in VN's novel Lolita (1955), Humbert Humbert tracks down Clare Quilty (a playwright and pornographer who abducted Lolita from the Elphinstone hospital) in his house near Parkington and murders him on September 25, 1952. The Battle of Stamford Bridge took place at the village of Stamford Bridge, East Riding of Yorkshire, in England, on 25 September 1066, between an English army under King Harold Godwinson and an invading Norwegian force led by King Harald Hardrada and the English king's brother Tostig Godwinson.

Describing the murder of Clare Quilty (a playwright and pornographer who abducted Lolita from the Elphinstone hospital), Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Lolita, 1955) mentions two flies beside themselves with a dawning sense of unbelievable luck: