Subject
[NABOKOV-L] A second Sunday tidbit,
related to Nabokov's Luzhin and "Suimate"
related to Nabokov's Luzhin and "Suimate"
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Date
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"My story was difficult to compose, but I greatly enjoyed taking advantage of this or that image and scene to introduce a fatal pattern into Luzhin's life and to endow the description of a garden, a journey, a sequence of humdrum events, with the semblance of a game of skill, and, especially in the final chapters, with that of a regular chess attack demolishing the innermost elements of the poor fellow's sanity. I would like to spare the time and effort of hack reviewers ...by drawing their attention to the first appearance of the frosted-window theme (associated with Luzhin's suicide, or rather suimate) as early as Chapter Eleven..." (VN, 1964, Foreword to "The Luzhin Defense").
This passage by Professor Huxley was brought up in the Nab-L a few years ago but, if our EDs agree, I think it worthwhile to offer it again, in relation to "The Luzhin Defense" ( the image of an "unseen player" and the world as a chess board).
I let the initial commentary, by R. H. Hutton stand ("Professor Huxley's Hidden Chess Player," - The Spectator; January 11, 1868).
Huxley's metaphor is unrelated to Nabokov's "suimate" of Luzhin because, as it's a chess-problem, there's no 'player on the other side.' It shall be either the character's mad genius, or the novel's Author, who'll set the rules in lieu of "Nature". The omniscient narrator doesn't take part in the actual competition altough it is he who determines how many chapters shall be needed to have its dummy-hero crushed.
"Professor Huxley has told the working-men of South London, in a very fine passage of his most masculine English, what seems to him the highest meaning of education. It is such a mastery of the laws of the great game which is always being played between the individual man or woman and an unseen player who plays the phenomena of the universe on fixed and more or less accessible rules, as will enable the human players to carry on the longest game with the most brilliant success. But we must not spoil by summarizing a passage which deserves to live in English literature, both for its vigour of style and the admirable, almost grand expression it gives to a particular creed which is gaining rapidly upon us, in spite of the desolation of its summit,-in spite of the stern, almost solemn, neglect with which it passes by our highest life:-
'Suppose it were perfectly certain that the life and fortune of every one of us would one day or other depend upon his winning or losing a game of chess. Don't you think that we should all consider it to be a primary duty to learn at least the names and the moves of the pieces; to have a notion of a gambit and a keen eye for all the means of giving and getting out of check? Do you not think that we should look with a disapprobation amounting to scorn upon the father who allowed his son, or the State which allowed its members, to grow up without knowing a pawn from a knight? Now, it is a very plain and elementary truth that the life, the fortune and the happiness of every one of us, and, more or less, of those who are connected with us, do depend upon our knowing something of the rules of a game infinitely more difficult and complicated than chess. It is a game which has been played for untold ages, every man and woman of us being one of the two players in a game of his or her own. The chess board is the world, the pieces the phenomena of the universe, the rules of the game are what we call the laws of nature. The player on the other side is hidden from us. All we know is that his play is always fair, just and patient. But, also, that he never overlooks a mistake or makes the smallest allowance for ignorance. To the man who plays well the highest stakes are paid with that sort of overflowing generosity with which the strong shows delight in strength. And one who plays ill is checkmated without haste, but without remorse. My metaphor will remind some of you of the famous picture in which Retzsch has depicted Satan playing at chess with man for his soul. Substitute for the mocking fiend in that picture a calm, strong angel who is playing for love as we say, and would rather lose than win, and I should accept it as an image of human life. Well, now what I mean by education is learning the rules of this mighty game. In other words, education is the instruction of the intellect in the laws of nature; and the fashioning of the affections, and of the will, into harmony with those laws'."
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This passage by Professor Huxley was brought up in the Nab-L a few years ago but, if our EDs agree, I think it worthwhile to offer it again, in relation to "The Luzhin Defense" ( the image of an "unseen player" and the world as a chess board).
I let the initial commentary, by R. H. Hutton stand ("Professor Huxley's Hidden Chess Player," - The Spectator; January 11, 1868).
Huxley's metaphor is unrelated to Nabokov's "suimate" of Luzhin because, as it's a chess-problem, there's no 'player on the other side.' It shall be either the character's mad genius, or the novel's Author, who'll set the rules in lieu of "Nature". The omniscient narrator doesn't take part in the actual competition altough it is he who determines how many chapters shall be needed to have its dummy-hero crushed.
"Professor Huxley has told the working-men of South London, in a very fine passage of his most masculine English, what seems to him the highest meaning of education. It is such a mastery of the laws of the great game which is always being played between the individual man or woman and an unseen player who plays the phenomena of the universe on fixed and more or less accessible rules, as will enable the human players to carry on the longest game with the most brilliant success. But we must not spoil by summarizing a passage which deserves to live in English literature, both for its vigour of style and the admirable, almost grand expression it gives to a particular creed which is gaining rapidly upon us, in spite of the desolation of its summit,-in spite of the stern, almost solemn, neglect with which it passes by our highest life:-
'Suppose it were perfectly certain that the life and fortune of every one of us would one day or other depend upon his winning or losing a game of chess. Don't you think that we should all consider it to be a primary duty to learn at least the names and the moves of the pieces; to have a notion of a gambit and a keen eye for all the means of giving and getting out of check? Do you not think that we should look with a disapprobation amounting to scorn upon the father who allowed his son, or the State which allowed its members, to grow up without knowing a pawn from a knight? Now, it is a very plain and elementary truth that the life, the fortune and the happiness of every one of us, and, more or less, of those who are connected with us, do depend upon our knowing something of the rules of a game infinitely more difficult and complicated than chess. It is a game which has been played for untold ages, every man and woman of us being one of the two players in a game of his or her own. The chess board is the world, the pieces the phenomena of the universe, the rules of the game are what we call the laws of nature. The player on the other side is hidden from us. All we know is that his play is always fair, just and patient. But, also, that he never overlooks a mistake or makes the smallest allowance for ignorance. To the man who plays well the highest stakes are paid with that sort of overflowing generosity with which the strong shows delight in strength. And one who plays ill is checkmated without haste, but without remorse. My metaphor will remind some of you of the famous picture in which Retzsch has depicted Satan playing at chess with man for his soul. Substitute for the mocking fiend in that picture a calm, strong angel who is playing for love as we say, and would rather lose than win, and I should accept it as an image of human life. Well, now what I mean by education is learning the rules of this mighty game. In other words, education is the instruction of the intellect in the laws of nature; and the fashioning of the affections, and of the will, into harmony with those laws'."
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/