Subject
[Fwd: There's a Glory for you!]
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Beginning at the next to last line of page 7 of the Vintage
paperback edition of Nabokov's _Glory_ starts 2 sentences
(mostly carried over to page 8) that read, "We could not
improve the [tooth]paste, so we improved the tube. Indeed
the aperture formed a transverse slit, so that the paste,
as it squeezed out, slid out onto the brush ... like a
ribbon."
At first impression this would seem more like one of the ads
in _Lolita_, which have been commented on by Appel in his
_Nabokov's Dark Cinema_ rather than the quite Russian
_Glory_ (see the entry in Appel's index on ads as literary
material, under the heading popular culture).
The difficulty with rereading Nabokov, as I was doing here,
is that one finds obvious things that one has missed before.
I immediately recalled the last line of e e cummings' poem
"POEM, OR BEAUTY HURTS MR VINAL" (caps by Mr cummings!)
which satirizes American ads and slogans:
"comes out like a ribbon lies flat on the brush"
published by 1926. I find no mention of this Mr cummings in
Boyd or elsewhere handy. Comments permitted, thanks.
John
---------------------------
EDITOR's COMMENT. We all know the Nabokovs home soap was "Pears" but
what was their English toothpaste brand? A challenge for all web search
wizards!
Beginning at the next to last line of page 7 of the Vintage
paperback edition of Nabokov's _Glory_ starts 2 sentences
(mostly carried over to page 8) that read, "We could not
improve the [tooth]paste, so we improved the tube. Indeed
the aperture formed a transverse slit, so that the paste,
as it squeezed out, slid out onto the brush ... like a
ribbon."
At first impression this would seem more like one of the ads
in _Lolita_, which have been commented on by Appel in his
_Nabokov's Dark Cinema_ rather than the quite Russian
_Glory_ (see the entry in Appel's index on ads as literary
material, under the heading popular culture).
The difficulty with rereading Nabokov, as I was doing here,
is that one finds obvious things that one has missed before.
I immediately recalled the last line of e e cummings' poem
"POEM, OR BEAUTY HURTS MR VINAL" (caps by Mr cummings!)
which satirizes American ads and slogans:
"comes out like a ribbon lies flat on the brush"
published by 1926. I find no mention of this Mr cummings in
Boyd or elsewhere handy. Comments permitted, thanks.
John
---------------------------
EDITOR's COMMENT. We all know the Nabokovs home soap was "Pears" but
what was their English toothpaste brand? A challenge for all web search
wizards!