Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0012938, Tue, 18 Jul 2006 11:23:36 EDT

Subject
Re: PALE FIRE MAP?
Date
Body

Dear Mr. Rymour,

I'm entranced by your map of Zembla. Would it be possible to make an image
available to the list?

Best,
Michael Saler

In a message dated 7/18/2006 7:45:49 AM Pacific Daylight Time,
NABOKV-L@HOLYCROSS.EDU writes:

Dear Don and List

I refer to Jansy's LATH-like inability to imagine retracing her steps
back to the lake.
I haven't tried to map the campus and environs in Pale Fire, but VN was
typically precise in his Zemblan geography.

I have a hobby for idle hours. My draught map of the The Kingdom of
Zembla is roughed out in pencil, and I've been toying with it for a
couple of years. But I've never found the time to render it as a file in
Adobe Illustrator.

My map shows a 200-mile penile peninsula (from Emblem Bay to Embla
Point), rooted in the Baltic coast at 57 deg north and pointing
permanently poleward (like so many Zemblan patriots and men of fashion)
along a meridian of 21 deg E.

I've tried to fit in all the names, although the locations of many
places are conjectural, such as the Dukedoms of Mone and Great and
Lesser Payne. I have taken liberties: It seemed to me that Onhava needed
a seaport on the Gulf of Surprise (Aros, at the mouth of the Silfhar
River), and I've added a simple rail network, with a line ( a triumph of
Zemblan engineering!) that traverses the Bera range from Yeslove to
Kalixhaven (how else would the sailors go home on leave?) not far from
Mt Glitterntin. That's in northern Gothland, almost on the border of
Thule. There is a (disused) spur line to Kobaltana.

But now Jansy has fired me up to attempt the campus and environs! (Jansy
- I shall contact you separately and post a photocopy of the Zembla map
-- it might give you a laugh).

Regards,

Tom (Rymour)

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Search the archive: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/archives/nabokv-l.html
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