Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

According to John Ray, Jr. (in VN’s novel Lolita, 1955, the author of the foreword to Humbert Humbert’s manuscript), Mrs. Richard F. Schiller (Lolita’s married name) died in childbed, giving birth to a stillborn girl, on Christmas Day 1952, in Gray Star, a settlement in the remotest Northwest:

Describing the Shadows (a regicidal organization), 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 copy of a French newspaper with the headline: L'EX-ROI DE ZEMBLA EST-IL À PARIS?:

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), he superstitiously cannot write out the odd dark word employed by his gardener with respect to Gradus (Shade's murderer):

Line 998: Some neighbor's gardener 

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):

In Canto Four of his poem John Shade (the poet in VN's novel Pale Fire, 1962) describes two methods of composing and mentions the abstract battle being concretely fought:

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:

According to the spectral narrators in VN's novel Transparent Things (1972), the future is but a figure of speech, a specter of thought:

Here's the person I want. Hullo, person! Doesn't hear me.

The poet in VN's novel Pale Fire (1962), John Shade is killed by Jakob Gradus (a member of the Shadows, a regicidal organization) on the evening of July 21, 1959. The Battle of the Pyramids, also known as the Battle of Embabeh, was fought on 21 July 1798 during the French invasion of Egypt and Syria. Occurring near the village of Embabeh, Ottoman Egypt, the battle was named by Napoleon after the distant Great Pyramid of Giza. Napoleon Bonaparte's last battle was the Battle of Waterloo (fought on Sunday, June 18, 1815).

Describing his enforced twelve-year-long separation (1893-1905) from Ada, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Ada, 1969) mentions the pyramids of Ladorah:

He traveled, he studied, he taught.

Describing his enforced twelve-year-long separation (1893-1905) from Ada, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Ada, 1969) mentions the pyramids of Ladorah and Lake Van:

He traveled, he studied, he taught.

Describing his second road trip with Lolita across the USA, Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Lolita, 1955) mentions Elphinstone, a small town in the Rocky Mountains where Lolita falls ill and is hospitalized on Tuesday, June 28: