Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0011136, Tue, 1 Mar 2005 11:33:22 -0800

Subject
Re: Fw: Burnberries: Ardis/Burn & Bear/Russia
Date
Body
Dear Jansy,

Yes, indeed I am not sure and have to find this chapter in this end of
Ada.
VN himself said, a propos ADA to Pivot, if memory serves, that "derrière
un mot, on trouve les ombres d'autres mots".
Probably my morula is just a shadow.

Best

Alain Andreu.


-----Original Message-----
From: "Donald B. Johnson" <chtodel@gss.ucsb.edu>
To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
Date: Mon, 28 Feb 2005 20:22:35 -0800
Subject: Re: Fw: Burnberries: Ardis/Burn & Bear/Russia

> Dear AA
>
> Thank you for bringing up the "morula". I learned this word in biology
> class
> a long long time ago and I thought about it ( and a "morula" becomes a
> "blastula"...) but almost repressed it.
> There are so many contrasting stimuli when I read VN that most of the
> time I
> try to deny or expel them along with Aqua´s ghost.
> You connected the embryologic "morula" to "just after the protagonists
> made
> love several hours" ( and there are indeed references to a lost
> "condom"
> floating in the river). It was a new association for me since I had
> only
> been thinking of Aqua´s abortion in relation to the morula. And yet I
> tried
> to find the chapter you mentioned and only found a connection to the
> "burnberry bushes"!
> "While the rustic feast was being prepared and distributed among the
> sun
> gouts of the traditional pine glade, the wild girl and her lover
> slipped
> away for a few moments of ravenous ardor in a ferny ravine where a rill
> dipped from ledge to ledge between tall burnberry bushes. The day was
> hot
> and breathless. The smallest pine had its cicada".
> I understood that B.Boyd connected the burnberry bush not to the
> mulberry
> bush but to another berry ( "bogberry" ) - but I haven´t yet read his
> annotations.
>
>
> The lovely association of murmuring water and "lapping" that came
> from
> one of VN´s poems was offered to us by Aboukassa and it produced a
> marvelous
> new "feel" to Aqua´s Russian dreamlike speech.
>
> Why don´t we bring up more VN´s poems in our list to work with
> them?
> Jansy
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Donald B. Johnson" <chtodel@gss.ucsb.edu>
> To: <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
> Sent: Monday, February 28, 2005 9:04 PM
> Subject: Re: Fw: Burnberries: Ardis/Burn & Bear/Russia
>
>
> Dear Jansy and List,
>
> I risk to be out of the topic (I've not reread this novel since a long
> time), but, your posting concerning latin roots of Ardis/ardere,(ardre,
> ardis in French) make me think another PLAUSIBLE "latin connection"
> with
> the mulberry theme : the latin word MORULA is a scientific word that
> VN,
> as a scientist, probably knew. Well known in IVF, in vitro
> fertilization,
> (I 've found this word in an old dictionnary - 1949-), I was wondering
> whether or not this connection is relevant. The mulberry appears, if
> memory is correct, in the end of Ada just after the protagonists made
> love several hours.
> One can find photos of the morula state of embryon on the web using
> Google.But I confess this posting is also a query:
> So, "only a mulberry" or another latin connection... ???? I look
> forward
> to reading comments from Ada's specialists of the List.
> Hoping my charabia readable, my apologies if unclear.
>
> Amitiés,
>
> AA
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: "D. Barton Johnson" <chtodel@cox.net>
> To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> Date: Sat, 26 Feb 2005 10:03:58 -0800
> Subject: Fw: Burnberries: Ardis/Burn & Bear/Russia
>
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello
> > To: don barton johnson
> > Sent: Friday, February 25, 2005 8:54 PM
> > Subject: Burnberries: Ardis/Burn & Bear/Russia
> >
> >
> > Dear Don and List,
> >
> > I don´t know if these links that take us from "Burnberries" to
> > "Russia/Ardis" are too far-fetched, but I´ll risk it.
> >
> > In Ada, ch.41 we find Trofim exclaiming " Barin, a Barin " and our
> > narrator pointedly translates "Barin" as "master" ( while at the
> same
> > time making a quick reference to Blanche and to Lucette, together
> with
> > a warning about disaster and horror caused by what might "seep
> > through" leather or woolies).
> >
> > In German, Bärin, means bear, the female bear ( and bears, Urs are
> also
> > connected to Lucette and, of course, to Rus/ Russia ).
> > The German word for berries ( "yagodami" ) is " Beeren" and that
> could
> > help us to associate Bear/Bärin/Beeren/Berries.
> >
> > Van writes one single line of poetry: " Ada, our ardors and arbors"
> > and, of course, we remember "Ardelia" and "Ardis". Now, to burn, in
> > latin, is "ardere"...
> >
> > Greetings,
> > Jansy
>
> ----- End forwarded message -----
>
> ----- End forwarded message -----

----- End forwarded message -----