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Date
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[EDNOTE. Faithful Nabokv-L correspondent Sandy Klein has forwarded many
links to extensive coverage of the recent news that The Original of
Laura will be published, which I have gathered into three installments.
(The content appears below; links and images are preserved in the
appended Word document.) There may be some duplication among these
articles, but there are also interesting insights, images, and comments
from DN. Thank you, Sandy! -- SES]
http://nysun.com/arts/nabokov-son-publish-not-burn-original-laura
Nabokov Son To Publish, Not Burn, ‘The Original of Laura’
By STAFF REPORTER OF THE SUN | April 24, 2008
Vladimir Nabokov’s son has decided to publish his father’s last novel,
against his wishes, Der Spiegel reported this week. Dmitri Nabokov, 73,
has agonized for years over whether to follow his father’s dying
instruction to burn the manuscript of the novel, called “The Original of
Laura,” which exists on a collection of 50 index cards stored in a Swiss
bank vault. He told Der Spiegel this week that he has decided not to
burn it. In the past, Mr. Nabokov has called the novel both “the most
concentrated distillation of [his father’s] creativity” and a “radical”
departure from his previous novels. His waffling on the question of
whether to burn or to publish led the critic Ron Rosenbaum earlier this
year to issue a public plea, in the online magazine Slate, for Mr.
Nabokov to make up his mind.
Thursday, April 24, 2008
http://papercuts.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/04/24/saving-laura-part-2-or-nabokovs-walled-garden/
April 24, 2008, 5:06 pm
Saving Laura, Part 2; Or, Nabokov’s Walled Garden
By Steve Coates
Vladimir Nabokov (Herbert Mitgang)
This newspaper was the principal conduit for early notice of “The
Original of Laura,” the novel that Vladimir Nabokov was working on
before his death in July 1977 at the age of 78, and the literary world
has remained intrigued ever since. (As my colleague Greg Cowles
mentioned here yesterday, Nabokov’s son and literary executor, Dmitri
Nabokov, is reported to have decided to publish the manuscript —
actually 50 or so pencil-inscribed index cards — which his father had
enjoined should be destroyed.) In the archives, I found a couple of old
articles that not only hinted at the gestation of “Laura” but that are
otherwise full of lovely Nabokoviana.
The first I’ll look at is a Jan. 5, 1977, article by Herbert Mitgang,
who visited Nabokov at the Montreaux Palace hotel in Switzerland, where
Nabokov lived for the last two decades of his life. Nabokov wasn’t ready
for one of his formal interviews, but he seemed happy to have Mitgang
come by for a friendly visit and even to take his picture.
Mitgang had learned from Nabokov’s editor in New York that Nabokov had
“completed his next novel in his head.”
“It’s all there: the characters, the scenes, the details. He is about to
do the actual writing on 3-by-5-inch cards. The cards are then filled
with words, shuffled, and, in his editor’s phrase, Mr. Nabokov will deal
himself a novel.
“Its reference title is ‘Tool,’ presumably an anagram, somehow based on
a character named Laura. But it is idle to speculate about the title or
the meaning, his editor says, because Mr. Nabokov likes to play games
with words, ideas and publishers, and it is impossible to tell until
those shuffled cards are typed into a manuscript.
“And what is the new novel about? This interviewer asked.
“ ‘If I told you,’ Mr. Nabokov replied, ‘that would be an interview.’ ”
But in something of a Nabokovian twist, Mitgang could have found an
answer to some of the mystery, the title of the new novel at least, in
his own newspaper — in the Book Review, to be precise. Exactly a month
earlier, on Dec. 5, Nabokov had responded to a Book Review survey asking
for authors’ comments on “the three books they most enjoyed this year.”
Movingly, Nabokov took the opportunity to inform readers about his
condition (he died some seven months later) and his preoccupations —
evading the question and instead listing “the three books I read during
the three summer months of 1976 while hospitalized in Lausanne.” The
first book is Dante’s “Inferno,” in Charles S. Singleton’s literalist
translation. The second is “The Butterflies of North America,” by
William H. Howe.
But the third, as he wrote, is “ ‘The Original of Laura.’ The not quite
finished manuscript of a novel which I had begun writing and reworking
before my illness and which was completed in my mind: I must have gone
through it some 50 times and in my diurnal delirium kept reading it
aloud to a small dream audience in a walled garden. My audience
consisted of peacocks, pigeons, my long dead parents, two cypresses,
several young nurses crouching around, and a family doctor so old as to
be almost invisible. Perhaps because of my stumblings and fits of
coughing the story of my poor Laura had less success with my listeners
than it will have, I hope, with intelligent reviewers when properly
published.”
http://www.theweekdaily.com/arts_leisure/books/40077/should_nabokovs_last_book_be_published_despite_his_dying_wish.html
Vladimir Nabokov: Rolling in his grave?
(AP Photo)
Should Nabokov’s last book be published despite his dying wish?
What happened
Dmitri Nabokov, son of Vladimir Nabokov, has decided to publish his
father’s last work, The Original of Laura, despite his father’s dying
wish that the manuscripts be destroyed.
What the commentators said
This has certainly been a “most tortuous dilemma” for Dmitri Nabokov,
said Kate Connolly in a Guardian blog. “If he fails to carry out his
father’s last will, Dmitri is effectively betraying him, but carry it
out and the world loses forever what is potentially a precious gift from
the grave from one of the greatest 20th-century novelists.” But one
thing’s for sure: “Publication of The Original of Laura is sure to
satisfy much curiosity.”
Dmitri’s decision to publish the book means that he “is a bad son AND
Vladimir was a terrible father for putting his boy in this position,”
said Gawker. And “if this last book turns out to be awful, Nabokov
scholars will dismiss it as something he never wanted printed anyway. We
all win. Except Dmitri.”
“I’d rather have more Nabokov than less in the world,” said Gregory
Cowles in The New York Times blog Paper Cuts. If Vladimir Nabokov’s last
work “doesn’t live up to his gratifyingly perfectionist standards—well,
it arrives with bucketloads of context, and if nothing else it will give
scholars another decoder ring to evaluate the cryptic Nabokovian oeuvre.”
The whole thing seems kind of fishy, said the blog The Literary Saloon.
“We always equate heirs publishing posthumous work with a desperate
attempt to cash in—is that what The Original of Laura has been reduced
to, too?”
http://news.muckety.com/2008/04/24/nabokovs-son-to-publish-final-manuscript/2372
Nabokov’s son to publish final manuscript
By Carol Eisenberg | April 24, 2008 at 11:46am
His dying father, Vladimir Nabokov, had commanded him to destroy his
still-unfinished, final novel.
Instead, an agonized Dmitri Nabokov placed the novel - in the form of 50
index cards - in a Swiss bank vault. Now, more than 30 years later, the
writer’s only child told Der Spiegel magazine that he had decided to
publish The Original of Laura.
Speaking from his winter home in Palm Beach, Fla. this week, the
73-year-old Dmitri Nabokov justified his decision, saying, “I’m a loyal
son and thought long and seriously about it. Then my father appeared
before me and said, with an ironic grin, ‘You’re stuck in a right old
mess - just go ahead and publish!’”
He told the magazine that he had finally made up his mind to do so.
Over the years, Dmitri Nabokov has described wrestling with the decision
about what to do with The Original of Laura, which he has camost concentrated distillation of [my father’s] creativity.” As
Nabokov’s literary executor, he said he felt a duty to share it with
the world; as his son, he felt a duty to honor his father’s last wishes.
Dmitri Nabokov, who divides his time between Palm Beach, Fla. and
Montreux, Switzerland, is a staunch advocate of his father’s literary
legacy, and has translated many of his novels, plays, poems, lectures
and letter.
In celebration of Vladimir Nabokov’s centennial in 1999, he appeared as
his father in Terry Quinn’s Dear Bunny, Dear Volodya, a dramatic reading
based on the personal letters between Nabokov and literary and social
critic Edmund Wilson. Performances took place in New York, Paris, Mainz,
and Ithaca.
Yet he is a multi-faceted personality with many other accomplishments. A
profile that appeared in the Harvard Crimson in 2005 described a complex
character.
Those who know him describe him as tall and imposing, with a face like
his father’s, and one editor calls him “his father’s very best
translator.”
But Dmitri has accrued a set of accolades and interests all his own.
“His love of fast boats and fast cars and helicopter skiing made him
like a James Bond figure,” says Deanne Urmy, editor of Nabokov’s
Butterflies, a collection of Vladimir’s writings which includes
translations by Nabokov.
He is best known as an opera star. After graduating from Harvard with a
concentration in history and literature, Dmitri Nabokov served briefly
in the U.S. military as an instructor in Russian before deciding to
pursue his dreams as a performer.
He made his operatic debut in 1961 in the same Milan performance of La
Boheme as the now legendary Luciano Pavarotti. Among the highlights from
his operatic career: performances at the Gran Teatre del Liceu in
Barcelona with soprano Montserrat Caballé and acclaimed Catalan tenor
Jaume Aragall, better known as Giacomo Aragall.
Complete article at the following URL:
http://www.slate.com/id/2190065/pagenum/all/#page_start
recycled: Previously published Slate articles made new.
The Fate of Nabokov's Laura
A Slate critic helps save Nabokov's last novel from destruction.
By Ron Rosenbaum
Posted Friday, April 25, 2008, at 5:12 PM ET
Dmitri Nabokov, son of the Russian novelist Vladimir, has kept the
literary world on tenterhooks for years over whether he'd obey his
father's dying wish by burning the incomplete manuscript of his final
novel, The Original of Laura, or appease scholars and fans alike by
publishing it. In January Slate's Ron Rosenbaum urged Dmitri to make a
decision, to "give us Laura" or "tell us that you intend to preserve the
mystery forever." This week, Dmitri officially announced that he would
make Laura available to the public.
Click here for Ron Rosenbaum's first essay on Dmitri's choice. His
second essay on the subject, "The Fate of Nabokov's Laura, Part II,"
reported in February that Dmitri was leaning toward publishing after a
conversation of sorts with his dead dad. That piece is reprinted below.
[ ... ]
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/04/posthumous-pu-1.html
Posthumous Publishing, Ctd
25 Apr 2008 08:59 pm
A reader writes:
Vladimir Nabokov may have had a touch of clairvoyance. His novel Pale
Fire's entire structure is the posthumous publishing of a character's
(believed to be unfinished) poem and the self-appointed editor's
extensive commentary about said poem. The commentary has little to do
with the poem itself, but rather focuses on the editor's quest to find
himself in the lines of a poem that is clearly not about him. It's
Nabokov, so naturally it's more complicated then that, but there is a
definite sense that Nabokov considers one man's interpretation of
another man's work to be more about the interpreter then the
interpreted.
Presumably, Dimitri Nabokov, who is also a writer as well as a
translator of his father's work, will provide commentary since The
Original of Laura was never fiserve his father's memory far better then Charles Kinbote served John
Shade in Pale Fire, I couldn't help but think about that novel and think
that Dimitri publishing his father's work is much more about him then it
is about Vladimir.
That being said, as a person who just adores Vladimir Nabokov's work, I
would have had a very hard time destroying his words. I do feel for
Dimitri, although I would hope that I would have followed my father's
wishes.
Published: 2008/04/26 08:26:27 GMT
Page last updated at 08:26 GMT, Saturday, 26 April 2008 09:26 UK
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7367655.stm
Last Nabokov work to be published
Vladimir Nabokov gained fame - and controversy - with his 1955 novel
Lolita
The son of late Lolita author Vladimir Nabokov has defended the decision
to publish the novelist's final work - against his father's last wishes.
Dmitri Nabokov told the BBC the thought that no-one would ever read the
manuscript was "very disturbing".
The Original of Laura was incomplete when Nabokov died in 1977 and the
author told his family to burn it.
"I never could envision myself burning or shredding this marvellous
work," Dmitri told BBC Radio 4's Open Book.
"I think my mother, understandably, wanted to satisfy his wishes but
could not bring herself to do it. It's such a wonderful thing."
For the last 30 years, the work has been the subject of much speculation
in the literary world, with Dmitri offering occasional hints as to its
quality.
'Worth preserving'
The author's son, who is also his father's literary executor, told the
show he thought his father would eventually have changed his mind about
publishing the manuscript.
"I think he would gradually, in a calmer moment, have yielded to the
desire of so many people to read this thing, and perhaps to his own
desire to preserve what was worth preserving in this work," he said.
He also denied that he would complete the work. "I would never presume
to finish my father's works for him, because there are so many strands
and threads and thoughts there that perhaps might have been developed
further," he said.
"And I simply don't have the right."
The full interview can be heard on Radio 4's Open Book on Sunday at 1600
BST.
Search the archive: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/archives/nabokv-l.html
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
links to extensive coverage of the recent news that The Original of
Laura will be published, which I have gathered into three installments.
(The content appears below; links and images are preserved in the
appended Word document.) There may be some duplication among these
articles, but there are also interesting insights, images, and comments
from DN. Thank you, Sandy! -- SES]
http://nysun.com/arts/nabokov-son-publish-not-burn-original-laura
Nabokov Son To Publish, Not Burn, ‘The Original of Laura’
By STAFF REPORTER OF THE SUN | April 24, 2008
Vladimir Nabokov’s son has decided to publish his father’s last novel,
against his wishes, Der Spiegel reported this week. Dmitri Nabokov, 73,
has agonized for years over whether to follow his father’s dying
instruction to burn the manuscript of the novel, called “The Original of
Laura,” which exists on a collection of 50 index cards stored in a Swiss
bank vault. He told Der Spiegel this week that he has decided not to
burn it. In the past, Mr. Nabokov has called the novel both “the most
concentrated distillation of [his father’s] creativity” and a “radical”
departure from his previous novels. His waffling on the question of
whether to burn or to publish led the critic Ron Rosenbaum earlier this
year to issue a public plea, in the online magazine Slate, for Mr.
Nabokov to make up his mind.
Thursday, April 24, 2008
http://papercuts.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/04/24/saving-laura-part-2-or-nabokovs-walled-garden/
April 24, 2008, 5:06 pm
Saving Laura, Part 2; Or, Nabokov’s Walled Garden
By Steve Coates
Vladimir Nabokov (Herbert Mitgang)
This newspaper was the principal conduit for early notice of “The
Original of Laura,” the novel that Vladimir Nabokov was working on
before his death in July 1977 at the age of 78, and the literary world
has remained intrigued ever since. (As my colleague Greg Cowles
mentioned here yesterday, Nabokov’s son and literary executor, Dmitri
Nabokov, is reported to have decided to publish the manuscript —
actually 50 or so pencil-inscribed index cards — which his father had
enjoined should be destroyed.) In the archives, I found a couple of old
articles that not only hinted at the gestation of “Laura” but that are
otherwise full of lovely Nabokoviana.
The first I’ll look at is a Jan. 5, 1977, article by Herbert Mitgang,
who visited Nabokov at the Montreaux Palace hotel in Switzerland, where
Nabokov lived for the last two decades of his life. Nabokov wasn’t ready
for one of his formal interviews, but he seemed happy to have Mitgang
come by for a friendly visit and even to take his picture.
Mitgang had learned from Nabokov’s editor in New York that Nabokov had
“completed his next novel in his head.”
“It’s all there: the characters, the scenes, the details. He is about to
do the actual writing on 3-by-5-inch cards. The cards are then filled
with words, shuffled, and, in his editor’s phrase, Mr. Nabokov will deal
himself a novel.
“Its reference title is ‘Tool,’ presumably an anagram, somehow based on
a character named Laura. But it is idle to speculate about the title or
the meaning, his editor says, because Mr. Nabokov likes to play games
with words, ideas and publishers, and it is impossible to tell until
those shuffled cards are typed into a manuscript.
“And what is the new novel about? This interviewer asked.
“ ‘If I told you,’ Mr. Nabokov replied, ‘that would be an interview.’ ”
But in something of a Nabokovian twist, Mitgang could have found an
answer to some of the mystery, the title of the new novel at least, in
his own newspaper — in the Book Review, to be precise. Exactly a month
earlier, on Dec. 5, Nabokov had responded to a Book Review survey asking
for authors’ comments on “the three books they most enjoyed this year.”
Movingly, Nabokov took the opportunity to inform readers about his
condition (he died some seven months later) and his preoccupations —
evading the question and instead listing “the three books I read during
the three summer months of 1976 while hospitalized in Lausanne.” The
first book is Dante’s “Inferno,” in Charles S. Singleton’s literalist
translation. The second is “The Butterflies of North America,” by
William H. Howe.
But the third, as he wrote, is “ ‘The Original of Laura.’ The not quite
finished manuscript of a novel which I had begun writing and reworking
before my illness and which was completed in my mind: I must have gone
through it some 50 times and in my diurnal delirium kept reading it
aloud to a small dream audience in a walled garden. My audience
consisted of peacocks, pigeons, my long dead parents, two cypresses,
several young nurses crouching around, and a family doctor so old as to
be almost invisible. Perhaps because of my stumblings and fits of
coughing the story of my poor Laura had less success with my listeners
than it will have, I hope, with intelligent reviewers when properly
published.”
http://www.theweekdaily.com/arts_leisure/books/40077/should_nabokovs_last_book_be_published_despite_his_dying_wish.html
Vladimir Nabokov: Rolling in his grave?
(AP Photo)
Should Nabokov’s last book be published despite his dying wish?
What happened
Dmitri Nabokov, son of Vladimir Nabokov, has decided to publish his
father’s last work, The Original of Laura, despite his father’s dying
wish that the manuscripts be destroyed.
What the commentators said
This has certainly been a “most tortuous dilemma” for Dmitri Nabokov,
said Kate Connolly in a Guardian blog. “If he fails to carry out his
father’s last will, Dmitri is effectively betraying him, but carry it
out and the world loses forever what is potentially a precious gift from
the grave from one of the greatest 20th-century novelists.” But one
thing’s for sure: “Publication of The Original of Laura is sure to
satisfy much curiosity.”
Dmitri’s decision to publish the book means that he “is a bad son AND
Vladimir was a terrible father for putting his boy in this position,”
said Gawker. And “if this last book turns out to be awful, Nabokov
scholars will dismiss it as something he never wanted printed anyway. We
all win. Except Dmitri.”
“I’d rather have more Nabokov than less in the world,” said Gregory
Cowles in The New York Times blog Paper Cuts. If Vladimir Nabokov’s last
work “doesn’t live up to his gratifyingly perfectionist standards—well,
it arrives with bucketloads of context, and if nothing else it will give
scholars another decoder ring to evaluate the cryptic Nabokovian oeuvre.”
The whole thing seems kind of fishy, said the blog The Literary Saloon.
“We always equate heirs publishing posthumous work with a desperate
attempt to cash in—is that what The Original of Laura has been reduced
to, too?”
http://news.muckety.com/2008/04/24/nabokovs-son-to-publish-final-manuscript/2372
Nabokov’s son to publish final manuscript
By Carol Eisenberg | April 24, 2008 at 11:46am
His dying father, Vladimir Nabokov, had commanded him to destroy his
still-unfinished, final novel.
Instead, an agonized Dmitri Nabokov placed the novel - in the form of 50
index cards - in a Swiss bank vault. Now, more than 30 years later, the
writer’s only child told Der Spiegel magazine that he had decided to
publish The Original of Laura.
Speaking from his winter home in Palm Beach, Fla. this week, the
73-year-old Dmitri Nabokov justified his decision, saying, “I’m a loyal
son and thought long and seriously about it. Then my father appeared
before me and said, with an ironic grin, ‘You’re stuck in a right old
mess - just go ahead and publish!’”
He told the magazine that he had finally made up his mind to do so.
Over the years, Dmitri Nabokov has described wrestling with the decision
about what to do with The Original of Laura, which he has camost concentrated distillation of [my father’s] creativity.” As
Nabokov’s literary executor, he said he felt a duty to share it with
the world; as his son, he felt a duty to honor his father’s last wishes.
Dmitri Nabokov, who divides his time between Palm Beach, Fla. and
Montreux, Switzerland, is a staunch advocate of his father’s literary
legacy, and has translated many of his novels, plays, poems, lectures
and letter.
In celebration of Vladimir Nabokov’s centennial in 1999, he appeared as
his father in Terry Quinn’s Dear Bunny, Dear Volodya, a dramatic reading
based on the personal letters between Nabokov and literary and social
critic Edmund Wilson. Performances took place in New York, Paris, Mainz,
and Ithaca.
Yet he is a multi-faceted personality with many other accomplishments. A
profile that appeared in the Harvard Crimson in 2005 described a complex
character.
Those who know him describe him as tall and imposing, with a face like
his father’s, and one editor calls him “his father’s very best
translator.”
But Dmitri has accrued a set of accolades and interests all his own.
“His love of fast boats and fast cars and helicopter skiing made him
like a James Bond figure,” says Deanne Urmy, editor of Nabokov’s
Butterflies, a collection of Vladimir’s writings which includes
translations by Nabokov.
He is best known as an opera star. After graduating from Harvard with a
concentration in history and literature, Dmitri Nabokov served briefly
in the U.S. military as an instructor in Russian before deciding to
pursue his dreams as a performer.
He made his operatic debut in 1961 in the same Milan performance of La
Boheme as the now legendary Luciano Pavarotti. Among the highlights from
his operatic career: performances at the Gran Teatre del Liceu in
Barcelona with soprano Montserrat Caballé and acclaimed Catalan tenor
Jaume Aragall, better known as Giacomo Aragall.
Complete article at the following URL:
http://www.slate.com/id/2190065/pagenum/all/#page_start
recycled: Previously published Slate articles made new.
The Fate of Nabokov's Laura
A Slate critic helps save Nabokov's last novel from destruction.
By Ron Rosenbaum
Posted Friday, April 25, 2008, at 5:12 PM ET
Dmitri Nabokov, son of the Russian novelist Vladimir, has kept the
literary world on tenterhooks for years over whether he'd obey his
father's dying wish by burning the incomplete manuscript of his final
novel, The Original of Laura, or appease scholars and fans alike by
publishing it. In January Slate's Ron Rosenbaum urged Dmitri to make a
decision, to "give us Laura" or "tell us that you intend to preserve the
mystery forever." This week, Dmitri officially announced that he would
make Laura available to the public.
Click here for Ron Rosenbaum's first essay on Dmitri's choice. His
second essay on the subject, "The Fate of Nabokov's Laura, Part II,"
reported in February that Dmitri was leaning toward publishing after a
conversation of sorts with his dead dad. That piece is reprinted below.
[ ... ]
http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/04/posthumous-pu-1.html
Posthumous Publishing, Ctd
25 Apr 2008 08:59 pm
A reader writes:
Vladimir Nabokov may have had a touch of clairvoyance. His novel Pale
Fire's entire structure is the posthumous publishing of a character's
(believed to be unfinished) poem and the self-appointed editor's
extensive commentary about said poem. The commentary has little to do
with the poem itself, but rather focuses on the editor's quest to find
himself in the lines of a poem that is clearly not about him. It's
Nabokov, so naturally it's more complicated then that, but there is a
definite sense that Nabokov considers one man's interpretation of
another man's work to be more about the interpreter then the
interpreted.
Presumably, Dimitri Nabokov, who is also a writer as well as a
translator of his father's work, will provide commentary since The
Original of Laura was never fiserve his father's memory far better then Charles Kinbote served John
Shade in Pale Fire, I couldn't help but think about that novel and think
that Dimitri publishing his father's work is much more about him then it
is about Vladimir.
That being said, as a person who just adores Vladimir Nabokov's work, I
would have had a very hard time destroying his words. I do feel for
Dimitri, although I would hope that I would have followed my father's
wishes.
Published: 2008/04/26 08:26:27 GMT
Page last updated at 08:26 GMT, Saturday, 26 April 2008 09:26 UK
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7367655.stm
Last Nabokov work to be published
Vladimir Nabokov gained fame - and controversy - with his 1955 novel
Lolita
The son of late Lolita author Vladimir Nabokov has defended the decision
to publish the novelist's final work - against his father's last wishes.
Dmitri Nabokov told the BBC the thought that no-one would ever read the
manuscript was "very disturbing".
The Original of Laura was incomplete when Nabokov died in 1977 and the
author told his family to burn it.
"I never could envision myself burning or shredding this marvellous
work," Dmitri told BBC Radio 4's Open Book.
"I think my mother, understandably, wanted to satisfy his wishes but
could not bring herself to do it. It's such a wonderful thing."
For the last 30 years, the work has been the subject of much speculation
in the literary world, with Dmitri offering occasional hints as to its
quality.
'Worth preserving'
The author's son, who is also his father's literary executor, told the
show he thought his father would eventually have changed his mind about
publishing the manuscript.
"I think he would gradually, in a calmer moment, have yielded to the
desire of so many people to read this thing, and perhaps to his own
desire to preserve what was worth preserving in this work," he said.
He also denied that he would complete the work. "I would never presume
to finish my father's works for him, because there are so many strands
and threads and thoughts there that perhaps might have been developed
further," he said.
"And I simply don't have the right."
The full interview can be heard on Radio 4's Open Book on Sunday at 1600
BST.
Search the archive: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/archives/nabokv-l.html
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