EDITOR's COMMENT. In answer to a specific questions below,--Yes, the Franklin K. Lane book is real; Professor C's psychology volume does not but Gennady Barabtarlo's book on Pnin might supply some details. Lots of additions for the Invisible Library bibliography (How Borgesian!) may be found in both The Real Life of Sebastian Knight & Look at the Harlequins!. 


-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Entries for the Invisible Library
Date: Thu, 17 Jan 2002 10:33:48 -0800 (PST)
From: Jerry Friedman <jerry_friedman@yahoo.com>
To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU


This  message  was  originally  submitted by  jerry_friedman@YAHOO.COM  to  the
NABOKV-L list at LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU. 

---------------- Message requiring your approval (107 lines) ------------------
Hi, all.  I subscribed to this list in 1998-99, and now I'm back to try to
contribute to the Invisible Library.  I enjoy that Web site
, a catalog of books that exist only in other books.  It already has entries for _Invitation to a
Beheading_, _Lolita_, _Pnin_, and _The Real Life of Sebastian Knight_.
I'm putting together a listing of non-existent books in _Pale Fire_, and
I'd be grateful for corrections.

The Invisible Library includes short stories, plays, and unpublished
manuscripts; it doesn't seem to include films, periodicals or articles in
them, individual letters, or works that are published in their entirety in
real books (
such as the poem _Pale Fire_).  It does list a few apparently
short poems, but I haven't bothered with the short poems mentioned in PF.
For those who don't want to visit the site, my entries below show the
format.  The Invisible Librarian, Brian Quinette, doesn't format titles in
any special way such as all-capitals or italics.  Under a given author and
title, he lists books alphabetically by pseudo-author and then
pseudo-title.  His notes are fairly short and usually don't include
publication dates; he'll probably shorten some of my notes as he did some
in the Gene Wolfe entries I contributed to.  (I think many Nabokovians
would like Wolfe's fiction, by the way.)

The Invisible Library also lists contributors.  I'll add the name of
anyone who supplies a book I missed or corrects an entry of mine.  You can
also e-mail entries, corrections, etc. to .

Before the listing, I have two questions: Were Franklin K. Lane's letters
ever collected?
Does Prof. C.'s textbook on psychoanalysis really exist?

Author: Nabokov, Vladimir
Title: Pale Fire
Pseudo-Author: Bretwit, Ferz and Zule
Pseudo-Title: unknown
Notes: Correspondence between two cousins, provincial mayors in Zembla,
published in Onhava in 1906 by Ferz Bretwit's widow.

Pseudo-Author: Conmal, Duke of Aros
Pseudo-Title: Timon Afinsken
Notes: A translation into Zemblan of Shakespeare's Timon of Athens.
Conmal wrote many other books: translations of the rest of Shakespeare and
of English poets from Milton to Kipling.

Pseudo-Author: de Faun, Jane
Pseudo-Titles: unknown
Notes: Ten volumes' worth of novels, long available in Zemblan translation
but strangely unknown in England

Pseudo-Author: Hodinski (also known as Hodyna), collector or forger
Pseudo-Title: unknown
Notes: Zemblan variants of the Kongs-skugg-sio (or -sjo; meaning The Royal
Mirror), a real Icelandic poem of the thirteenth century.  Possibly
unpublished.

Pseudo-Author: Kinbote, Charles X
Pseudo-Tit
le: unknown
Notes: On surnames, written presumably in Zemblan, English translation
published in Oxford, 1956.

Pseudo-Author: Shade, John
Pseudo-Title: Dim Gulf
Notes: Shade's first book of poems (free verse)

Pseudo-Author: Shade, John
Pseudo-Title: Hebe's Cup
Notes: Shade's third book of poems

Pseudo-Author: Shade, John
Pseudo-Title: Night Rote
Notes: Shade's second book of poems (this and his later poetry are
presumably all metered verse)

Pseudo-Author: Shade, John
Pseudo-Title: Poems
Notes: Shade used this title for all his later books of poems (number
unknown).

Pseudo-Author: Shade, John
Pseudo-Title: Supremely Blest
Notes: About Alexander Pope.

Pseudo-Author: Shade, John
Pseudo-Title: Taming a Seahorse
Notes: Essays

Pseudo-Author: Shade, Samuel
Pseudo-Title: Birds of Mexico
Notes: With figures by the author's wife, the former Caroline Lukin.  John
Shade was this couple's son.

Pseudo-Author: Unknown
Pseudo-Title: Historia Zemblica

Pseudo-Author: Unknown
Pseudo-Tit
le: Merman, The
Notes: A Zemblan play, "a fine old melodrama"

Pseudo-Author: Unknown (possibly anonymous)
Pseudo-Title: Unknown
Notes: The Zemblan counterpart of the Elder Edda.


Jerry Friedman

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