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Re: Oriental Skrotomoff
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Alexey Sklyarenko: "Oriental Skrotomoff" may sound Russian but actually is a play on Korotom. Cf. Greg's words to Ada: "Percy started it - and was defeated in a clean match of Korotom wrestling, as used in Teristan and Sorokat - my father, I'm sure, could tell you all about it." ...Korotom seems to hint at koro, "a culture specific syndrom, occuring chiefly in China and southeastern Asia, characterized by anxiety and fear of retraction of the penis or breasts and labia into the body." King Wing (Demon's wrestling master) must have taught Van a couple of grips
JM: Let's return to the line you quoted and to one that precedes it: "Van, his crab claws on the ready, contemplated him, hoping for a pretext to inflict a certain special device of exotic torture that he had not yet had the opportunity to use in a real fight [...]
"Your cousin has treated Greg and your humble servant to a most bracing exhibition of Oriental Skrotomoff or whatever the name may be.’."
Nabokov must have had Freud's male "penis envy" in mind when he described Percy's "ugly machine" ( "In all his life, said stolid Greg to Van, he had never seen such an ugly engine, surgically circumcised, terrifically oversized and high-colored, with such a phenomenal cœur de bœuf; nor had either of the fascinated, fastidious boys ever witnessed the like of its sustained, strongly arched, practically everlasting stream."),a scene that came immediately before the scuffle started.
When I suddenly doubted that Skrotomoff was a Russian word I had no inkling of its being a hint to "koro" (safely orientalized!), but I envisaged the word in English ("Skrotom") with its ending in "off"... It looked a puerile pun (right in the mood of the boy's fight) but, if "koro" was really in Nab's mind, then its condensation is very cleverly achieved.
btw: it's not the first time that Nabokov mentions a "coeur de boeuf," is it? ( in Pale Fire?)
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JM: Let's return to the line you quoted and to one that precedes it: "Van, his crab claws on the ready, contemplated him, hoping for a pretext to inflict a certain special device of exotic torture that he had not yet had the opportunity to use in a real fight [...]
"Your cousin has treated Greg and your humble servant to a most bracing exhibition of Oriental Skrotomoff or whatever the name may be.’."
Nabokov must have had Freud's male "penis envy" in mind when he described Percy's "ugly machine" ( "In all his life, said stolid Greg to Van, he had never seen such an ugly engine, surgically circumcised, terrifically oversized and high-colored, with such a phenomenal cœur de bœuf; nor had either of the fascinated, fastidious boys ever witnessed the like of its sustained, strongly arched, practically everlasting stream."),a scene that came immediately before the scuffle started.
When I suddenly doubted that Skrotomoff was a Russian word I had no inkling of its being a hint to "koro" (safely orientalized!), but I envisaged the word in English ("Skrotom") with its ending in "off"... It looked a puerile pun (right in the mood of the boy's fight) but, if "koro" was really in Nab's mind, then its condensation is very cleverly achieved.
btw: it's not the first time that Nabokov mentions a "coeur de boeuf," is it? ( in Pale Fire?)
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/