Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0009809, Fri, 14 May 2004 14:59:44 -0700

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----- Original Message -----
From: David Haan
To: nabokv-l@listserv.ucsb.edu
Given Nabokov's stated aversion to influences German and Freudian, I was amused to learn via "The Kibitzer" at http://www.chesscafe.com that one model for a certain defenestrated protagonist may be doubly qualified:

⌠'Poetic ideals'

"In 1893, Von Bardeleben▓s book Die Wiener Partie [Eine Schach-Theoretische Abhandlung, i.e., The Vienna Game: A Chess-Theoretic Treatise] was published in Leipzig. It summed up roughly the first half century of experience with the Vienna Game, which had really sprung from the games of Hofrat Hampe (1814-76) and his contemporaries.

"In his introduction, Von Bardeleben lamented that the theoretical investigation of gambit play nowadays has a rather academic character, because theory deals so much with traps that in practice rarely, if ever, happen any more, e.g. the Allgaier, Muzio and Kieseritrsky [sic] Gambits. These gambits, he wrote, are the poetic ideals, but practical chess play is sober and unpoetic."

Curt von Bardeleben also co-authored a "Textbook on Chess-Playing" with Jacques Mieses; the latter machine-translates as "bad Jacques", but that's a different story ...

(cf. http://listserv.ucsb.edu/lsv-cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0310&L=nabokv-l&P=R37716 )

;D


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