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Fw: Fw: Fw: Sontag on VN
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EDNOTE. Beth Sweeney is among the illustrious who have served as President
of the International Nabokov Society.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Susan Elizabeth Sweeney" <ssweeney@holycross.edu>
To: <chtodel@cox.net>; <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
Sent: Monday, January 06, 2003 7:33 AM
Subject: Re: Fw: Fw: Sontag on VN
Sontag was certainly impressed by VN when I met her at a dinner party in the
late 1980s. She asked me about the subject of my dissertation--parodies of
detective fiction in the postmodern novel--and I explained that I had
published a couple of essays on Nabokov but had been told that a
dissertation comparing his work to other writers like Robbe-Grillet, Borges,
Pynchon, and Auster would be more "marketable." Sontag countered that
surely if anyone justified a single-author dissertation, it was Nabokov.
Unfortunately, though, it was too late for me to follow her advice. :)
Susan Elizabeth Sweeney
>>> chtodel@cox.net 01/04/03 13:44 PM >>>
EDNOTE. Personally I am not a big fan of Ms Sontag's work, but any possible
tie she might have had with VN is cerainly "fair game" for NABOKV-L. She was
obviously a major in the intellectual clime of the Sixties & Seventies.
----- Original Message -----
From: Will Schultz
To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
Sent: Saturday, January 04, 2003 1:40 AM
Subject: Re: Fw: Sontag
didn't Sontag also once write something about the "clear poetry of Mao (tse
Tung)" , or something along those lines ? Does she really deserve this
forum's attention ?
D. Barton Johnson wrote:
EDNOTE: Mr. Nicol is among the founding fathers of the International
Vladimir Nabokov.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Charles Nicol" <ejnicol@scifac.indstate.edu>
----------------- Message requiring your approval (24
lines) ------------------
When Sontag's essay on Camp came out, I thought it was
somewhat relevant to Kinbote's sensibility in PALE FIRE.
Incidentally, while I was playing at a chess tournament in Kalamazoo,
circa 1965, Sontag gave a talk there which seemed mostly a list of
names of contemporary authors, composers, nd painters who somehow
had earned her approval. In the questions period afterward, I
specifically asked why she had singled out Boulez and not Stockhausen
(she turned out to be right on that one), and why Borges and not
Nabokov. Her reply was basically along the lines of "Nabokov? No,
Borges." So she wasn't too impressed back then.
Chaz
Charles Nicol
Professor of English and Humanities
Indiana State University
Terre Haute, IN 47809
U.S.A.
(812) 237-3152
FAX (812) 237-3156
chaz@indstate.edu
"For me a work of fiction only exists insofar as it affords me
what I shall bluntly call aesthetic bliss..."
--Vladimir Nabokov
of the International Nabokov Society.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Susan Elizabeth Sweeney" <ssweeney@holycross.edu>
To: <chtodel@cox.net>; <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
Sent: Monday, January 06, 2003 7:33 AM
Subject: Re: Fw: Fw: Sontag on VN
Sontag was certainly impressed by VN when I met her at a dinner party in the
late 1980s. She asked me about the subject of my dissertation--parodies of
detective fiction in the postmodern novel--and I explained that I had
published a couple of essays on Nabokov but had been told that a
dissertation comparing his work to other writers like Robbe-Grillet, Borges,
Pynchon, and Auster would be more "marketable." Sontag countered that
surely if anyone justified a single-author dissertation, it was Nabokov.
Unfortunately, though, it was too late for me to follow her advice. :)
Susan Elizabeth Sweeney
>>> chtodel@cox.net 01/04/03 13:44 PM >>>
EDNOTE. Personally I am not a big fan of Ms Sontag's work, but any possible
tie she might have had with VN is cerainly "fair game" for NABOKV-L. She was
obviously a major in the intellectual clime of the Sixties & Seventies.
----- Original Message -----
From: Will Schultz
To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
Sent: Saturday, January 04, 2003 1:40 AM
Subject: Re: Fw: Sontag
didn't Sontag also once write something about the "clear poetry of Mao (tse
Tung)" , or something along those lines ? Does she really deserve this
forum's attention ?
D. Barton Johnson wrote:
EDNOTE: Mr. Nicol is among the founding fathers of the International
Vladimir Nabokov.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Charles Nicol" <ejnicol@scifac.indstate.edu>
----------------- Message requiring your approval (24
lines) ------------------
When Sontag's essay on Camp came out, I thought it was
somewhat relevant to Kinbote's sensibility in PALE FIRE.
Incidentally, while I was playing at a chess tournament in Kalamazoo,
circa 1965, Sontag gave a talk there which seemed mostly a list of
names of contemporary authors, composers, nd painters who somehow
had earned her approval. In the questions period afterward, I
specifically asked why she had singled out Boulez and not Stockhausen
(she turned out to be right on that one), and why Borges and not
Nabokov. Her reply was basically along the lines of "Nabokov? No,
Borges." So she wasn't too impressed back then.
Chaz
Charles Nicol
Professor of English and Humanities
Indiana State University
Terre Haute, IN 47809
U.S.A.
(812) 237-3152
FAX (812) 237-3156
chaz@indstate.edu
"For me a work of fiction only exists insofar as it affords me
what I shall bluntly call aesthetic bliss..."
--Vladimir Nabokov