Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0011934, Mon, 19 Sep 2005 19:18:39 -0700

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Fwd: Re: An Editor's Woes
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----- Forwarded message from phil@carolina.rr.com -----
Date: Mon, 19 Sep 2005 21:23:57 -0400
From: Phil Howerton <phil@carolina.rr.com>
Reply-To: Phil Howerton <phil@carolina.rr.com>
Subject: Re: An Editor's Woes
To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum


Having printed out and re-read the exchange, I don't see how Dolinin's comments,
as quoted by Shapiro, can be interpreted other than the Shapiro way. Speaking
as a lawyer and not as a literary scholar, which I am not and never could be,
but merely a Nabokov reader, and considering Dolinin's response as well as your
your own explanation of what you think Dolonin was trying to do, it seems to me
that if you are right, he could have said something like: "Although Nabokov
and his family were forced to leave Russia not of their own free will and
thereafter were forced to leave France and the emigre community, again not of
their own free will, he was nevertheless compelled by these circumstances to
explain his (not wholly) abandonment of writing in his native tongue for
writing in English. One may believe of disbelieve his several explanations of
this process, but to disbelieve them is to adopt the opposite view, namely that
he left Russia, left France, switched to English and deserted his Russian/Sirin
birthright, all of his own free will and princcipally in order to live a
comfortable life and become an economically successful writer. In doing so he
voluntarily discarded his Russian personae."

Surely no one believes this. I simply don't undersatnd what Dolinin is trying
to say other than the plain meaning of his words.

The second of his quotes, from Shapiro, it seems to me, is particularly strange,
inasmuch as Dolinin is slamming not only Nabokov but also, among others, his
biographers. I wonder how Boyd feel about this. And does Dolinin give
examples of Nabokov's personal inventions, exaggerations, evasions and
half-truths? What are they?

There is no doubt that Nabokov created his own literary personae but who in the
hell doesn't? Who doesn't keep his or her public life separate from their
private life? Fitzgerald? Hemingway? Faulkner? You? Me? I can assure you
that my personae on the bench, dealing with whom I have to deal with every
working day, is a tad different from that off the bench. It has to be, or Mary
would leave me.

I don't mean this to stir up anything. I write and send it in my own effort to
try and understand what was being said here.

Best.

Phil









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