Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

In Canto Four of his poem John Shade (the poet in VN's novel Pale Fire, 1962) says that there are two methods of composing, method A and method B, and compares the poet, when he uses method A, to an automaton:

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

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) mentions Prof. H's guest, a decrepit emeritus from Boston - whom his host described with deep respect as "a true Patrician, a real blue-blooded Brahmin:"

In his Foreword 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) calls Shade "my beloved old conjurer:"

When Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) leaves Ardis forever, Blanche (a French handmaid at Ardis) talks all the way about the young chatelaine and her two recent lovers in melodious low tones as if in a trance, as if en rapport with a dead minstrel’s spirit:

Describing the death of Marina (Van's, Ada's and Lucette's mother who dies of cancer and whose body is burnt, according to her instructions), Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) uses the phrase "now that everything was tripitaka (safely packed):"

The characters in VN’s novel Lolita (1955) include Professor Chem (as Humbert dubs him), Humbert's and Lolita's landlord in Beardsley who teaches chemistry at Beardsley University:

Describing his plans to marry Charlotte (Lolita's mother), Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Lolita, 1955) calls himself "Humbert the Cubus" (a play on "incubus," a word used by Humbert at the end of the preceding paragraph):

Describing Fleur de Fyler's attempts to seduce him, 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 broken viola d'amore that Fleur kept trying to mend:

In The Enchanted Hunters (a hotel in Briceland where Humbert and Lolita spend their first night together) Lolita tells Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Lolita, 1955) how she was seduced in Camp Q and mentions a very special canoe which she shared with Barbara Burke (the camp's best swimmer):

I was more interested, however, in heterosexual experience. She had entered the sixth grade at eleven, soon after moving to Ramsdale from the Middle West. What did she mean by “pretty bad”?

The name of the capital of Kinbote's Zembla (in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, a distant northern land), Onhava seems to hint at heaven.