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CORRECTION - [NABOKOV-L] [THOUGHTS] JOHNSON
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On a Feb.11, 2011 LRB article, by C.Burrow, about a new edition of Johnson's lives... Extract: "The first life in the collection, that of Abraham Cowley, includes Johnson's classic excursus on 'a race of writers that may be termed the metaphysical poets', which describes a tradition and then relentlessly anatomises its faults: '...nature and art are ransacked for illustrations, comparisons, and allusions; their learning instructs..." Johnson's affection for 'nature' and for direct expression meant that he hated poems that were encrusted with allusions to pagan deities or rehearsed second-hand pastoral conventions..."
JM: In "Ada" several poets who were adept to "second-hand pastoral conventions" and "metaphysical tastes" were satirized, but they were not those Johnson had itn mind*. However, I only found one rather vague mention to a certain Captain Cowley, and it doesn't seem to indicate this Abraham Cowley at all: "In his bedroom he found a somewhat belated invitation to the Captain's table for dinner. He...remembered Captain Cowley as a bore and an ignoramus."
In "Pale Fire" Shade mentions that Sybil translated Marvel and Donne into French. In his commentary (to line 678), Kinbote is severely and minuciously critical of her achivements. If, as C. Burrow points out, "Johnson saw in Swift's mental decline a parallel to his own battles with 'vile melancholy'.[...].Never extenuating but never carping at faults, Johnson describes the slippage of a mind into catastrophe...in such a way that you could imagine it happening to anyone, including the author." Shade's reference to Swift could be considered sympathetically close to Johnson's: "And minds that died before arriving there:/ Poor old man Swift, poor -, poor Baudelaire" (a variant, revealed by Kinbote on his note to line 231:"how ludicrous", to which he adds, rather surprisingly: "was there something else - some obscure intuition, some prophetic scruple that prevented him from spelling out the name of an eminent man who happened to be an intimate friend of his?")
On his commentary to line 230, Kinbote shows that he doesn't partake of Johnson's moral view of human fortitute fighting off self-indulgence. He projected his trust in God's ways: "the scientific and the supernatural, the miracle of the muscle and the miracle of the mind, are both inexplicable as are all the ways of Our Lord."
In "TOOL" (at least once) there's a direct reference to the English nature poets and .. to the.contemporary descriptions of intercourse ("because newborn and thus generalized ....in the sense of primitive organisms of art as opposed to the personal achievements of great English poets dealing with an evening in the country, a bit of sky in a river, the nostalgia of remote sounds - things utterly beyond the reach of Homer or Horace."
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* wiki on S. Johnson's coinage: "This does not necessarily imply that he intended metaphysical to be used in its true sense, in that he was probably referring to a witticism of John Dryden, who said of John Donne: "He affects the metaphysics, not only in his satires, but in his amorous verses, where nature only should reign; and perplexes the minds of the fair sex with nice speculations of philosophy, when he should engage their hearts, and entertain them with the softnesses of love. In this . . . Mr. Cowley has copied him to a fault."
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JM: In "Ada" several poets who were adept to "second-hand pastoral conventions" and "metaphysical tastes" were satirized, but they were not those Johnson had itn mind*. However, I only found one rather vague mention to a certain Captain Cowley, and it doesn't seem to indicate this Abraham Cowley at all: "In his bedroom he found a somewhat belated invitation to the Captain's table for dinner. He...remembered Captain Cowley as a bore and an ignoramus."
In "Pale Fire" Shade mentions that Sybil translated Marvel and Donne into French. In his commentary (to line 678), Kinbote is severely and minuciously critical of her achivements. If, as C. Burrow points out, "Johnson saw in Swift's mental decline a parallel to his own battles with 'vile melancholy'.[...].Never extenuating but never carping at faults, Johnson describes the slippage of a mind into catastrophe...in such a way that you could imagine it happening to anyone, including the author." Shade's reference to Swift could be considered sympathetically close to Johnson's: "And minds that died before arriving there:/ Poor old man Swift, poor -, poor Baudelaire" (a variant, revealed by Kinbote on his note to line 231:"how ludicrous", to which he adds, rather surprisingly: "was there something else - some obscure intuition, some prophetic scruple that prevented him from spelling out the name of an eminent man who happened to be an intimate friend of his?")
On his commentary to line 230, Kinbote shows that he doesn't partake of Johnson's moral view of human fortitute fighting off self-indulgence. He projected his trust in God's ways: "the scientific and the supernatural, the miracle of the muscle and the miracle of the mind, are both inexplicable as are all the ways of Our Lord."
In "TOOL" (at least once) there's a direct reference to the English nature poets and .. to the.contemporary descriptions of intercourse ("because newborn and thus generalized ....in the sense of primitive organisms of art as opposed to the personal achievements of great English poets dealing with an evening in the country, a bit of sky in a river, the nostalgia of remote sounds - things utterly beyond the reach of Homer or Horace."
................................................................................
* wiki on S. Johnson's coinage: "This does not necessarily imply that he intended metaphysical to be used in its true sense, in that he was probably referring to a witticism of John Dryden, who said of John Donne: "He affects the metaphysics, not only in his satires, but in his amorous verses, where nature only should reign; and perplexes the minds of the fair sex with nice speculations of philosophy, when he should engage their hearts, and entertain them with the softnesses of love. In this . . . Mr. Cowley has copied him to a fault."
Search archive with Google:
http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=site:listserv.ucsb.edu&HL=en
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Visit "Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
Manage subscription options: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/