Subject
Ob in Sobytie & in Izobretenie Val'sa
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Date
Body
The only real place mentioned in VN's plays Sobytie ("The Event," 1938) and Izobretenie Val'sa ("The Waltz Invention," 1938) is Barnaul (a city in and the capital of the Altai territory, on the Ob river):
Любовь. Я знаю, что вы обожаете развлекаться чужими делами. Шерлок Холмс из Барнаула. (Act Two)
Lyubov' jokingly calls Ryovshin, who loves to poke his nose into other people's affairs, "a Sherlock Holmes from Barnaul."
Sobyitie and izobretenie both have ob in them. And so does Koba (Stalin's nackname, see anagram below). According to Troshcheykin, Barbashin is lovok kak obez'yana (deft as a monkey):
Барбошин. Извините, что ограничиваюсь полунамёками. Тайна исповеди. Но к делу, к делу. Что вам не нравится в этом отличном окошке?
Трощейкин. Смотрите: совсем рядом водосточная труба, и по ней легко можно взобраться.
Барбошин. Контрклиент может себе сломать шею.
Трощейкин. Он ловок, как обезьяна! (Act Three)
Barboshin's polunamyoki (subtle hints) bring to mind the closing lines of Baratynski's poem Blagosloven svyatoe vozvestivshiy ("Blest is he who announced a holy thing..." 1839):
Благословен святое возвестивший!
Но в глубине разврата не погиб
Какой-нибудь неправедный изгиб
Сердец людских пред нами обнаживший.
Две области: сияния и тьмы
Исследовать равно стремимся мы.
Плод яблони со древа упадает:
Закон небес постигнул человек!
Так в дикий смысл порока посвящает
Нас иногда один его намек.
...Thus sometimes only a hint of vice
introduces us into its preposterous meaning.
According to Baratynski, dve oblasti: siyaniya i t'my / issledovat' ravno stremimsya my ("We equally attempt to study two realms: that of radiance and that of darkness"). The title of VN's novel Bend Sinister (1947) is sometimes translated as "Zloveshchiy izgib," as a possible allusion to nepravednyi izgib serdets lyudskikh (some iniquitous twist of human hearts) in Baratynski's poem. A person who revealed this izgib (bend; twist) of human hearts "did not perish in the depth of depravity."
At the end of "The Event" Lyubov' mentions obryv (a precipice) in her life:
Любовь. Ну, вы не много мне сказали. Я думала, что вы предскажете мне что-нибудь необыкновенное, потрясающее... например, что в жизни у меня сейчас обрыв, что меня ждёт удивительное, страшное, волшебное счастье... (ibid.)
Obryv ("The Precipice," 1869) is novel by Goncharov, the author of Obyknovennaya istoriya ("A Common Story," 1847) and Oblomov (1859). In a letter of beginning of May, 1889, to Suvorin Chekhov criticizes Oblomov and says that his play Leshiy ("The Wood Demon" later reworked into Uncle Vanya, 1890) vytantsovyvaetsya (is coming off). The verb vytantsovyvat'sya used by Chekhov comes from tantsevat' (to dance). Troshcheykin's wife Lyubov' is a daughter of Antonina Pavlovna Opoyashin, the writer whose name and patronymic hint at Chekhov. The portrait painter Aleksey Maksimovich Troshcheykin is a namesake of Maxim Gorky (penname of A. M. Peshkov). The author of The Event and The Waltz Invention is a namesake of V. V. Mayakovski (1893-1930). In his poem Oblako v shtanakh ("The Trousered Cloud," 1915) VN's "late namesake" mentions Faust gliding with Mephistopheles in heavenly parquet and says that a nail in his boot is more nightmarish than a fantasy of Goethe:
Что мне до Фауста,
феерией ракет
скользящего с Мефистофелем в небесном паркете!
Я знаю -
гвоздь у меня в сапоге
кошмарней, чем фантазия у Гете!
Barboshin (the private detective hired by Troshcheykin to protect himself from Barbashin) complains that his shoe troubles him. He takes it off, finds that a nail sticks out and asks for molotochek (a little hammer) or something:
Барбошин. Меня этот башмак давно беспокоит. (Стаскивает его.)... (исследуя башмак). Так и знал: гвоздь торчит... Молоточек, что-нибудь... Хорошо, дайте это...(Act Three)
The phrase Khorosho, dayte eto ("Ok, give me this") hints at two poems by Mayakovski: Khorosho ("Good," 1927) and Pro eto (About it," 1923). In the latter poem eto (it) is lyubov' (love).
In The Waltz Invention Waltz listens to the song of a whore and recognizes his own juvenile verses:
Толстая (начинает вдруг петь, -- на мотив "Отойди, не гляди").
Темнота и паром,
и вдали огоньки,
и прощанье навек
у широкой реки... (Act Three)
On the bank of a wide river the girl parts forever with her lover, a convict. The wide river in the whore's song is presumably Ob.
Salvator Waltz's real name seems to be Leonid Barbashin, and the action of The Waltz Invention seems to take place in Lyubov's dream that she dreams "in the sleep of death." At the end of The Event Lyubov' tells Meshaev the Second (the occultist who reads Lyubov's palm) that she thought he would have predicted to her a wonderful, terrifying, magical schast'ye (bliss) awaiting her. In his poem Pora, moy drug, pora... ('Tis time, my dear, 'tis time... 1834) quoted by Hermann, the narrator and main character in VN's novel Otchayanie ("Despair," 1934), Pushkin says: na svete schast'ya net ( there is no bliss on earth).
Пора, мой друг, пора! покоя сердце просит —
Летят за днями дни, и каждый час уносит
Частичку бытия, а мы с тобой вдвоём
Предполагаем жить, и глядь — как раз умрём.
На свете счастья нет, но есть покой и воля.
Давно завидная мечтается мне доля —
Давно, усталый раб, замыслил я побег
В обитель дальную трудов и чистых нег.
'Tis time, my dear, 'tis time. The heart demands repose.
Day after day flits by, and with each hour there goes
A little bit of life; but meanwhile you and I
Together plan to dwell… yet lo! 'tis then we die.
There is no bliss on earth: there is peace and freedom, though.
An enviable lot I long have yearned to know:
Long have I, weary slave, been contemplating flight
To a remote abode of work and pure delight.
Pobeg (flight) and obitel' (abode) have ob in them.
In The Waltz Invention Waltz wants to rule the world from Palmora (in the English version, Palmera), a distant island. In The Event Troshcheykin contemplates flight and mentions "the palms of somnolent Vampuka:"
Трощейкин. Нам нужно бежать...
Любовь. Да, да, да!
Трощейкин. ...бежать, -- а мы почему-то медлим под пальмами сонной Вампуки. Я чувствую, что надвигается...
Любовь. Опасность? Но какая? О, если б ты мог понять!
Трощейкин. Опасность, столь же реальная, как наши руки, плечи, щёки. Люба, мы совершенно одни.
Любовь. Да, одни. Но это два одиночества, и оба совсем круглы. Пойми меня! (Act Two)
"Yes, we are alone. But these are two solitudes, and both are perfectly round. Try to understand me!" There is ob in oba (both), the word used by Lyubov'.
Nabokov + molotok + bal = Oblomov + Kant + oblako = Molotov + Koba + balkon = obmolot + vobla/obval + konka = moloko + bolvan + obkat = obman + kolokol + botva = boloto + bokal + amvon + k
molotok - hammer
bal - ball, dance; narrative poem (1828) by Baratynski
Kant - Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), German philosopher
oblako - cloud
Molotov - Soviet statesman (V. M. Skryabin, 1890-1986), commissar of foreign affairs; former name of Perm; cf. "Molotov cocktail"
balkon - balcony
obmolot - threshing
vobla - Caspian roach (according to Waltz, he detests vobla)
obval - falling; landslip
konka - horse-drawn tram
moloko - milk
bolvan - blockhead; dummy; idol
obkat - smoothing out, etc.
obman - deception; illusion
kolokol - bell
botva - leafy tops of root vegetables
boloto - marsh; bog
bokal - glass; goblet; poem (1835) by Baratynski
amvon - ambo, pulpit
k - to, towards
Btw., the name Opoyashin can also hint at OPOYAZ (Obshchestvo izucheniya poeticheskogo yazyka), "Society for the Study of Poetic Language," a prominent group of linguists and literary critics in St. Petersburg founded in 1916 and dissolved by the early 1930s. The group included Viktor Shklovsky, Boris Eikhenbaum, Osip Brik (the husband of Mayakovski's mistress Lilya Brik) and Yuri Tynyanov.
Alexey Sklyarenko
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
Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
AdaOnline: "http://www.ada.auckland.ac.nz/
The Nabokov Society of Japan's Annotations to Ada: http://vnjapan.org/main/ada/index.html
The VN Bibliography Blog: http://vnbiblio.com/
Search the archive with L-Soft: https://listserv.ucsb.edu/lsv-cgi-bin/wa?A0=NABOKV-L
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Любовь. Я знаю, что вы обожаете развлекаться чужими делами. Шерлок Холмс из Барнаула. (Act Two)
Lyubov' jokingly calls Ryovshin, who loves to poke his nose into other people's affairs, "a Sherlock Holmes from Barnaul."
Sobyitie and izobretenie both have ob in them. And so does Koba (Stalin's nackname, see anagram below). According to Troshcheykin, Barbashin is lovok kak obez'yana (deft as a monkey):
Барбошин. Извините, что ограничиваюсь полунамёками. Тайна исповеди. Но к делу, к делу. Что вам не нравится в этом отличном окошке?
Трощейкин. Смотрите: совсем рядом водосточная труба, и по ней легко можно взобраться.
Барбошин. Контрклиент может себе сломать шею.
Трощейкин. Он ловок, как обезьяна! (Act Three)
Barboshin's polunamyoki (subtle hints) bring to mind the closing lines of Baratynski's poem Blagosloven svyatoe vozvestivshiy ("Blest is he who announced a holy thing..." 1839):
Благословен святое возвестивший!
Но в глубине разврата не погиб
Какой-нибудь неправедный изгиб
Сердец людских пред нами обнаживший.
Две области: сияния и тьмы
Исследовать равно стремимся мы.
Плод яблони со древа упадает:
Закон небес постигнул человек!
Так в дикий смысл порока посвящает
Нас иногда один его намек.
...Thus sometimes only a hint of vice
introduces us into its preposterous meaning.
According to Baratynski, dve oblasti: siyaniya i t'my / issledovat' ravno stremimsya my ("We equally attempt to study two realms: that of radiance and that of darkness"). The title of VN's novel Bend Sinister (1947) is sometimes translated as "Zloveshchiy izgib," as a possible allusion to nepravednyi izgib serdets lyudskikh (some iniquitous twist of human hearts) in Baratynski's poem. A person who revealed this izgib (bend; twist) of human hearts "did not perish in the depth of depravity."
At the end of "The Event" Lyubov' mentions obryv (a precipice) in her life:
Любовь. Ну, вы не много мне сказали. Я думала, что вы предскажете мне что-нибудь необыкновенное, потрясающее... например, что в жизни у меня сейчас обрыв, что меня ждёт удивительное, страшное, волшебное счастье... (ibid.)
Obryv ("The Precipice," 1869) is novel by Goncharov, the author of Obyknovennaya istoriya ("A Common Story," 1847) and Oblomov (1859). In a letter of beginning of May, 1889, to Suvorin Chekhov criticizes Oblomov and says that his play Leshiy ("The Wood Demon" later reworked into Uncle Vanya, 1890) vytantsovyvaetsya (is coming off). The verb vytantsovyvat'sya used by Chekhov comes from tantsevat' (to dance). Troshcheykin's wife Lyubov' is a daughter of Antonina Pavlovna Opoyashin, the writer whose name and patronymic hint at Chekhov. The portrait painter Aleksey Maksimovich Troshcheykin is a namesake of Maxim Gorky (penname of A. M. Peshkov). The author of The Event and The Waltz Invention is a namesake of V. V. Mayakovski (1893-1930). In his poem Oblako v shtanakh ("The Trousered Cloud," 1915) VN's "late namesake" mentions Faust gliding with Mephistopheles in heavenly parquet and says that a nail in his boot is more nightmarish than a fantasy of Goethe:
Что мне до Фауста,
феерией ракет
скользящего с Мефистофелем в небесном паркете!
Я знаю -
гвоздь у меня в сапоге
кошмарней, чем фантазия у Гете!
Barboshin (the private detective hired by Troshcheykin to protect himself from Barbashin) complains that his shoe troubles him. He takes it off, finds that a nail sticks out and asks for molotochek (a little hammer) or something:
Барбошин. Меня этот башмак давно беспокоит. (Стаскивает его.)... (исследуя башмак). Так и знал: гвоздь торчит... Молоточек, что-нибудь... Хорошо, дайте это...(Act Three)
The phrase Khorosho, dayte eto ("Ok, give me this") hints at two poems by Mayakovski: Khorosho ("Good," 1927) and Pro eto (About it," 1923). In the latter poem eto (it) is lyubov' (love).
In The Waltz Invention Waltz listens to the song of a whore and recognizes his own juvenile verses:
Толстая (начинает вдруг петь, -- на мотив "Отойди, не гляди").
Темнота и паром,
и вдали огоньки,
и прощанье навек
у широкой реки... (Act Three)
On the bank of a wide river the girl parts forever with her lover, a convict. The wide river in the whore's song is presumably Ob.
Salvator Waltz's real name seems to be Leonid Barbashin, and the action of The Waltz Invention seems to take place in Lyubov's dream that she dreams "in the sleep of death." At the end of The Event Lyubov' tells Meshaev the Second (the occultist who reads Lyubov's palm) that she thought he would have predicted to her a wonderful, terrifying, magical schast'ye (bliss) awaiting her. In his poem Pora, moy drug, pora... ('Tis time, my dear, 'tis time... 1834) quoted by Hermann, the narrator and main character in VN's novel Otchayanie ("Despair," 1934), Pushkin says: na svete schast'ya net ( there is no bliss on earth).
Пора, мой друг, пора! покоя сердце просит —
Летят за днями дни, и каждый час уносит
Частичку бытия, а мы с тобой вдвоём
Предполагаем жить, и глядь — как раз умрём.
На свете счастья нет, но есть покой и воля.
Давно завидная мечтается мне доля —
Давно, усталый раб, замыслил я побег
В обитель дальную трудов и чистых нег.
'Tis time, my dear, 'tis time. The heart demands repose.
Day after day flits by, and with each hour there goes
A little bit of life; but meanwhile you and I
Together plan to dwell… yet lo! 'tis then we die.
There is no bliss on earth: there is peace and freedom, though.
An enviable lot I long have yearned to know:
Long have I, weary slave, been contemplating flight
To a remote abode of work and pure delight.
Pobeg (flight) and obitel' (abode) have ob in them.
In The Waltz Invention Waltz wants to rule the world from Palmora (in the English version, Palmera), a distant island. In The Event Troshcheykin contemplates flight and mentions "the palms of somnolent Vampuka:"
Трощейкин. Нам нужно бежать...
Любовь. Да, да, да!
Трощейкин. ...бежать, -- а мы почему-то медлим под пальмами сонной Вампуки. Я чувствую, что надвигается...
Любовь. Опасность? Но какая? О, если б ты мог понять!
Трощейкин. Опасность, столь же реальная, как наши руки, плечи, щёки. Люба, мы совершенно одни.
Любовь. Да, одни. Но это два одиночества, и оба совсем круглы. Пойми меня! (Act Two)
"Yes, we are alone. But these are two solitudes, and both are perfectly round. Try to understand me!" There is ob in oba (both), the word used by Lyubov'.
Nabokov + molotok + bal = Oblomov + Kant + oblako = Molotov + Koba + balkon = obmolot + vobla/obval + konka = moloko + bolvan + obkat = obman + kolokol + botva = boloto + bokal + amvon + k
molotok - hammer
bal - ball, dance; narrative poem (1828) by Baratynski
Kant - Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), German philosopher
oblako - cloud
Molotov - Soviet statesman (V. M. Skryabin, 1890-1986), commissar of foreign affairs; former name of Perm; cf. "Molotov cocktail"
balkon - balcony
obmolot - threshing
vobla - Caspian roach (according to Waltz, he detests vobla)
obval - falling; landslip
konka - horse-drawn tram
moloko - milk
bolvan - blockhead; dummy; idol
obkat - smoothing out, etc.
obman - deception; illusion
kolokol - bell
botva - leafy tops of root vegetables
boloto - marsh; bog
bokal - glass; goblet; poem (1835) by Baratynski
amvon - ambo, pulpit
k - to, towards
Btw., the name Opoyashin can also hint at OPOYAZ (Obshchestvo izucheniya poeticheskogo yazyka), "Society for the Study of Poetic Language," a prominent group of linguists and literary critics in St. Petersburg founded in 1916 and dissolved by the early 1930s. The group included Viktor Shklovsky, Boris Eikhenbaum, Osip Brik (the husband of Mayakovski's mistress Lilya Brik) and Yuri Tynyanov.
Alexey Sklyarenko
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
Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
AdaOnline: "http://www.ada.auckland.ac.nz/
The Nabokov Society of Japan's Annotations to Ada: http://vnjapan.org/main/ada/index.html
The VN Bibliography Blog: http://vnbiblio.com/
Search the archive with L-Soft: https://listserv.ucsb.edu/lsv-cgi-bin/wa?A0=NABOKV-L
Manage subscription options :http://listserv.ucsb.edu/lsv-cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=NABOKV-L