Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0007325, Tue, 31 Dec 2002 16:22:16 -0800

Subject
Fw: Susan Sontag, camp, and Nabokov
Date
Body
----- Original Message -----
From: "Susan Elizabeth Sweeney" <ssweeney@holycross.edu>
(42 lines) ------------------

> Something else these writers have in common: Andrew Field alludes to both
in his novel Fractions.
>
> SES
> -------------------------------------------------------
> >>> chtodel@cox.net 12/31/02 15:52 PM >>>
> EDNOTE. Susan Sontag has introduced VN at least once and spoken well of
his
> writing elsewhere. If VN has spoken of SS, I do not recall it. I would
guess
> that any linkage of their names is that SS's "camp" essay and book
_Against
> Interpretation_ made a splash in the sixties when VN was among the most
> heard names on the American literary scene.
>
> From: <VainerVi@aol.com>
>
>
> I am trying to find the most accurate Russian translation/equivalent
> for the
> word "sensibility" as it's been used in Susan Sontag's essay Notes on
> "Camp."
> I know all the options our dictionaries provide, and I hope I
> understand, albeit somewhat vaguely, what Susan Sontag had in mind. The
word
> is a key term for the essay, so it would be great to hear the experts'
> opinion(s).
>
> I am sure that many of my fellow Nabokovians know Susan Sontag and this
> particular essay (Notes on "Camp"). To refresh their memory, I include the
> first 1.5 paragraph of it here:
>
> "Many things in the world have not been named; and many things, even if
> they have been named, have never been described. One of these is the
> sensibility -- unmistakably modern, a variant of sophistication but
hardly
> identical with it -- that goes by the cult name of "Camp."
> A sensibility (as distinct from an idea) is one of the hardest things to
> talk about..."
>
> Actually, when you come to think about it, these two subjects
> (Nabokov and "Camp") do not look completely unrelated. I may be wrong,
but
> to my taste it could ignite a fruitful discussion.
>
> Victoria
> > >
> >
>