Subject
Fw: ADA's "Quelques Fleurs" & quelque chose for the last time
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EDNOTE. See also my note at bottom.
----- Original Message -----
From: "marie bouchet" <mmariebouchet@hotmail.com>
>
> ----------------- Message requiring your approval (72
lines) ------------------
>
> Dear Alex,
>
> Indeed "Quelques Fleurs" is a French perfume by Houbigant (one of the
> oldest perfume "maisons" in France), and this perfume can still be
> purchased. I may add to your comments that this flowery reference may not
> only be part of the thematic network linking French literature to flowers
in
> the novel (see the translation of the "souci d'eau" in Rimbaud's poem, or
> the references to Proust and the "jeune filles en fleurs") but may more
> directly hint at the flower herbium Marina made in her youth, in which
Van's
> birth and his exchange for Aqua's stillborn baby are cryptically told.
> Indeed these "quelques fleurs" glued in Marina's notebook told the
entwining
> destinies of the two sisters, and this herbium can be considered a flowery
> narrative of Van's birth, mis-en-abyme within the novel telling his life.
> All the best,
>
> Marie.
>
> >From: "D. Barton Johnson" <chtodel@cox.net>
> >Reply-To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
> >To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> >Subject: ADA's "Quelques Fleurs" & quelque chose for the last time
> >Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 10:50:28 -0700
> >
> >EDNOTE. Alexey Sklyarenko has done a new Rusian translation of ADA.
> >NABOKV-L will shortly run comparative samples of the various
translations.
> >----- Original Message -----
> >From: alex
> >
> >Dear all of you, who might remember that topic or is interested in it,
> >
> >Last year I suggested that Fleurs in the name of the talc powder Quelques
> >Fleurs, which Aqua sees on her former bedside table when she breaks into
> >Demon's country house at Kitezh after escaping from a madhouse (Ada, part
> >One, chapter 3), hints at the title of Baudelaire's famous book Fleurs du
> >Mal, while "quelques" is here from a common French phrase quelque chose
> >(something). It was discovered that such a parfume (Quelques Fleurs) had
> >really existed (and may still exist), and Carolyn Kunin provided even a
> >picture of several items of that line of cosmetics advertised on the
> >Internet.
> >But now it appears that I was probably right, after all:
> >both talc and the phrase "ce quelque chose" (spelled in French) occur
very
> >near from each other, practically on the same page, in Herzen's novel Kto
> >vinovat? ("Who is to blame?"), 1847. An incidental character in it, the
> >wife of NN's marshal of nobility, for twenty years conducts a little
> >guerilla warfare inside her house, now and then making sallies for
> >peasants' eggs and talc powders (Part Two, III). When her daughter Vava
(a
> >quaint diminutive of Varvara) reaches marriageable age, she begins to
> >terrorize the girl scoring her for doing nothing to attract suitors. Vava
> >isn't a beauty, but she has a rich substitution of pretty looks ("v ney
> >byla bogataya zamena krasoty"), this something, ce quelque chose, that,
> >like bouquet of a good wine, exists only for a connoisseur... One
assumes,
> >that, in spite of all the mother's efforts to improve the girl's looks
> >(with the help of various extravagant cosmetics like the cucumber water
> >with the addition of some powder, all of which is supposed to make her
look
> >paler), Vava will never marry and her rare something will go to waste.
> >I would like to add that one of the novel's characters is Dr Krupov. He
is
> >the protagonist and narrator of Herzen's short story Doktor Krupov, 1847.
> >This short story comprises a study by Dr Krupov entitled "About the
mental
> >disease in general and its epidemic spreading in particular" (O
dushevnykh
> >boleznyakh voobshche i ob epidemicheskom razvitii onykh v osobennosti).
The
> >spreading of insanity on Antiterra after the L disaster also seems to
have
> >an epidemic character. Aqua Veen is just one of the many poor creatures
who
> >fall sick.
> >I noticed some other minor references in Ada to Herzen's novel.
> >
> >cheers,
> >Alexey
>
> _________________________________________________________________
> Trouvez l'âme soeur sur MSN Rencontres ! http://g.msn.fr/FR1000/9551
------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------
EDNOTE. First and least, NB the absolutely uncanny French MSN tag just
above. Second, both
Alex and Marie may be right. VN's allusions are often multiple.Third, I call
attention to another echo of the "talc" theme in the following passage from
ADA III-2:
"Although Lucette had never died before - no, dived before, Violet - from
such a height, in such a disorder of shadows and snaking reflections, she
went with hardly a splash through the wave that humped to welcome her. That
perfect end was spoiled by her instinctively surfacing in an immediate
sweep - instead of surrendering under water to her drugged lassitude as she
had planned to do on her last night ashore if it ever did come to this. The
silly girl had not rehearsed the technique of suicide as, say, free-fall
parachutists do every day in the element of another chapter. Owing to the
tumultuous swell and her not being sure which way to peer through the spray
and the darkness and her own tentaclinging hair - t,a,c,l - she could not
make out the lights of the liner, an easily imagined many-eyed bulk mightily
receding in heartless triumph. Now I've lost my next note."
>
----- Original Message -----
From: "marie bouchet" <mmariebouchet@hotmail.com>
>
> ----------------- Message requiring your approval (72
lines) ------------------
>
> Dear Alex,
>
> Indeed "Quelques Fleurs" is a French perfume by Houbigant (one of the
> oldest perfume "maisons" in France), and this perfume can still be
> purchased. I may add to your comments that this flowery reference may not
> only be part of the thematic network linking French literature to flowers
in
> the novel (see the translation of the "souci d'eau" in Rimbaud's poem, or
> the references to Proust and the "jeune filles en fleurs") but may more
> directly hint at the flower herbium Marina made in her youth, in which
Van's
> birth and his exchange for Aqua's stillborn baby are cryptically told.
> Indeed these "quelques fleurs" glued in Marina's notebook told the
entwining
> destinies of the two sisters, and this herbium can be considered a flowery
> narrative of Van's birth, mis-en-abyme within the novel telling his life.
> All the best,
>
> Marie.
>
> >From: "D. Barton Johnson" <chtodel@cox.net>
> >Reply-To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
> >To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> >Subject: ADA's "Quelques Fleurs" & quelque chose for the last time
> >Date: Mon, 12 May 2003 10:50:28 -0700
> >
> >EDNOTE. Alexey Sklyarenko has done a new Rusian translation of ADA.
> >NABOKV-L will shortly run comparative samples of the various
translations.
> >----- Original Message -----
> >From: alex
> >
> >Dear all of you, who might remember that topic or is interested in it,
> >
> >Last year I suggested that Fleurs in the name of the talc powder Quelques
> >Fleurs, which Aqua sees on her former bedside table when she breaks into
> >Demon's country house at Kitezh after escaping from a madhouse (Ada, part
> >One, chapter 3), hints at the title of Baudelaire's famous book Fleurs du
> >Mal, while "quelques" is here from a common French phrase quelque chose
> >(something). It was discovered that such a parfume (Quelques Fleurs) had
> >really existed (and may still exist), and Carolyn Kunin provided even a
> >picture of several items of that line of cosmetics advertised on the
> >Internet.
> >But now it appears that I was probably right, after all:
> >both talc and the phrase "ce quelque chose" (spelled in French) occur
very
> >near from each other, practically on the same page, in Herzen's novel Kto
> >vinovat? ("Who is to blame?"), 1847. An incidental character in it, the
> >wife of NN's marshal of nobility, for twenty years conducts a little
> >guerilla warfare inside her house, now and then making sallies for
> >peasants' eggs and talc powders (Part Two, III). When her daughter Vava
(a
> >quaint diminutive of Varvara) reaches marriageable age, she begins to
> >terrorize the girl scoring her for doing nothing to attract suitors. Vava
> >isn't a beauty, but she has a rich substitution of pretty looks ("v ney
> >byla bogataya zamena krasoty"), this something, ce quelque chose, that,
> >like bouquet of a good wine, exists only for a connoisseur... One
assumes,
> >that, in spite of all the mother's efforts to improve the girl's looks
> >(with the help of various extravagant cosmetics like the cucumber water
> >with the addition of some powder, all of which is supposed to make her
look
> >paler), Vava will never marry and her rare something will go to waste.
> >I would like to add that one of the novel's characters is Dr Krupov. He
is
> >the protagonist and narrator of Herzen's short story Doktor Krupov, 1847.
> >This short story comprises a study by Dr Krupov entitled "About the
mental
> >disease in general and its epidemic spreading in particular" (O
dushevnykh
> >boleznyakh voobshche i ob epidemicheskom razvitii onykh v osobennosti).
The
> >spreading of insanity on Antiterra after the L disaster also seems to
have
> >an epidemic character. Aqua Veen is just one of the many poor creatures
who
> >fall sick.
> >I noticed some other minor references in Ada to Herzen's novel.
> >
> >cheers,
> >Alexey
>
> _________________________________________________________________
> Trouvez l'âme soeur sur MSN Rencontres ! http://g.msn.fr/FR1000/9551
------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------
EDNOTE. First and least, NB the absolutely uncanny French MSN tag just
above. Second, both
Alex and Marie may be right. VN's allusions are often multiple.Third, I call
attention to another echo of the "talc" theme in the following passage from
ADA III-2:
"Although Lucette had never died before - no, dived before, Violet - from
such a height, in such a disorder of shadows and snaking reflections, she
went with hardly a splash through the wave that humped to welcome her. That
perfect end was spoiled by her instinctively surfacing in an immediate
sweep - instead of surrendering under water to her drugged lassitude as she
had planned to do on her last night ashore if it ever did come to this. The
silly girl had not rehearsed the technique of suicide as, say, free-fall
parachutists do every day in the element of another chapter. Owing to the
tumultuous swell and her not being sure which way to peer through the spray
and the darkness and her own tentaclinging hair - t,a,c,l - she could not
make out the lights of the liner, an easily imagined many-eyed bulk mightily
receding in heartless triumph. Now I've lost my next note."
>