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Fw: Fw: anti-communism and Nabokov
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Date
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----- Original Message -----
From: "Galya Diment" <galya@u.washington.edu>
To: "Vladimir Nabokov Forum" <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
Sent: Tuesday, April 22, 2003 11:54 AM
Subject: Re: Fw: anti-communism and Nabokov
>
> ----------------- Message requiring your approval (67
lines) ------------------
>
> I think VN and politics is a valid topic. Both Don and I contributed
> articles which dealt with it and which came out in Discourse and Ideology
> in Nabokov's Prose, ed. David H. J. Larmour, Routledge Harwood Academic
> Publishers, 2002. There was plenty of misunderstanding on both sides,
> including VN's. But let's PLEASE not drag the "JUST-WAR-ON-TERROR"
> discussion into it -- or whose blindness, moral or otherwise, is
> involved in that one. As a former Soviet subject whose family suffered
> directly during the purges, I deeply resent and reject the attempts of
> using the situation there and in Eastern Europe to justify current
> attempts at "preventive strikes" and "regime changes." This is NOT a
> discussion for this list -- but I could not help responding to Phil since
> he introduced it.
>
> Galya
>
>
> On Tue, 22 Apr 2003, D. Barton Johnson wrote:
>
> > anti-communism and Nabokov
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Phil Howerton
> > To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
> > Sent: Monday, April 21, 2003 2:21 PM
> > Subject: Re: Fw: anti-communism and Nabokov
> >
> >
> > Don:
> >
> > I agree with you that it may be a question of a generation gap. I was a
sophomore in college in 1956 when the Soviets brutally crushed the Hungarian
revolt, killing all those young, brave people in the streets, and I have
detested them and, indeed, all other totalitarian regimes ever since. VN
and his family, you know, were sort of victims; like, say, Vaclav Havel and,
oh, about thirty million other folks.
> >
> > On the other hand, the academic failure to comprehend VN's feelings may
be just another instance of the kind of political stuff that we've come to
expect from the "herd of independent minds;" an expression that Jean Bethke
Elshtain fondly quotes in her book, "Just War Against Terror," as a
description of the dominant intellectual class.
> >
> > On the still other hand, it may simply be a case of mass moral
blindness. But don't get me started, not here.
> >
> > Best.
> >
> > Phil
> >
> > Judge Philip F. Howerton, Jr.
> > 2812 Sunset Drive
> > Charlotte, NC 28209
> >
> > "To be proud, to be brave, to be free." Vladimir Nabokov
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: D. Barton Johnson
> > To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> > Sent: Monday, April 21, 2003 3:14 PM
> > Subject: Fw: anti-communism and Nabokov
> >
> >
> > EDNOTE. NABOKV-L thanks Carolyn Kunin for this note. Although I am
averse to discussion of VN's political views, I would add one thought. I
suspect the recent discussion reflects a generation gap. As one who was an
adult (more or less) in the fifties and especially one who knew many
emigres, I find nothing in any way surprising about VN's outspoken
anti-Communism and his wholesale extension of this view to those less ardent
than himself. It is now half a hundred years later and his views may seem
less than temperate to a new generation. It would perhaps be more charitable
to drop the matter and recall that VN's remarks about Chaplin, Roman
Jakobson, and Sartre et al. were lapses from his principled distaste for
politics in art and scholarship.
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Carolyn Kunin
> > To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
> > Sent: Monday, April 21, 2003 11:04 AM
> > Subject: anti-communism and Nabokov
> >
> >
> > It is sometimes difficult for Westerners, even now, to understand
anti-communism. The reasons for this are too complicated to go into, but I
would like to suggest that anyone interested in this question would do well
to look at Martin Amis' Koba the dread; Laughter and the twenty millions (I
hope I got that right). Mr Amis tries to understand this phenomenon. No one
would think of asking why Nabokov would not have wanted to meet, say, the
conductor von Karajan, whose Nazi sympathies are well known, but the
question can still arrise as to why he wouldn't want to meet Chaplin, whose
communist sympathies are also well known.
> >
> > Martin Amis, for whom Nabokov serves as a political beacon, tries to
come to terms with this problem and the book, though not without faults, is
well worth reading for anyone interested in Nabokov's political thought.
> >
> > Carolyn Kunin
>
>
From: "Galya Diment" <galya@u.washington.edu>
To: "Vladimir Nabokov Forum" <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
Sent: Tuesday, April 22, 2003 11:54 AM
Subject: Re: Fw: anti-communism and Nabokov
>
> ----------------- Message requiring your approval (67
lines) ------------------
>
> I think VN and politics is a valid topic. Both Don and I contributed
> articles which dealt with it and which came out in Discourse and Ideology
> in Nabokov's Prose, ed. David H. J. Larmour, Routledge Harwood Academic
> Publishers, 2002. There was plenty of misunderstanding on both sides,
> including VN's. But let's PLEASE not drag the "JUST-WAR-ON-TERROR"
> discussion into it -- or whose blindness, moral or otherwise, is
> involved in that one. As a former Soviet subject whose family suffered
> directly during the purges, I deeply resent and reject the attempts of
> using the situation there and in Eastern Europe to justify current
> attempts at "preventive strikes" and "regime changes." This is NOT a
> discussion for this list -- but I could not help responding to Phil since
> he introduced it.
>
> Galya
>
>
> On Tue, 22 Apr 2003, D. Barton Johnson wrote:
>
> > anti-communism and Nabokov
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Phil Howerton
> > To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
> > Sent: Monday, April 21, 2003 2:21 PM
> > Subject: Re: Fw: anti-communism and Nabokov
> >
> >
> > Don:
> >
> > I agree with you that it may be a question of a generation gap. I was a
sophomore in college in 1956 when the Soviets brutally crushed the Hungarian
revolt, killing all those young, brave people in the streets, and I have
detested them and, indeed, all other totalitarian regimes ever since. VN
and his family, you know, were sort of victims; like, say, Vaclav Havel and,
oh, about thirty million other folks.
> >
> > On the other hand, the academic failure to comprehend VN's feelings may
be just another instance of the kind of political stuff that we've come to
expect from the "herd of independent minds;" an expression that Jean Bethke
Elshtain fondly quotes in her book, "Just War Against Terror," as a
description of the dominant intellectual class.
> >
> > On the still other hand, it may simply be a case of mass moral
blindness. But don't get me started, not here.
> >
> > Best.
> >
> > Phil
> >
> > Judge Philip F. Howerton, Jr.
> > 2812 Sunset Drive
> > Charlotte, NC 28209
> >
> > "To be proud, to be brave, to be free." Vladimir Nabokov
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: D. Barton Johnson
> > To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> > Sent: Monday, April 21, 2003 3:14 PM
> > Subject: Fw: anti-communism and Nabokov
> >
> >
> > EDNOTE. NABOKV-L thanks Carolyn Kunin for this note. Although I am
averse to discussion of VN's political views, I would add one thought. I
suspect the recent discussion reflects a generation gap. As one who was an
adult (more or less) in the fifties and especially one who knew many
emigres, I find nothing in any way surprising about VN's outspoken
anti-Communism and his wholesale extension of this view to those less ardent
than himself. It is now half a hundred years later and his views may seem
less than temperate to a new generation. It would perhaps be more charitable
to drop the matter and recall that VN's remarks about Chaplin, Roman
Jakobson, and Sartre et al. were lapses from his principled distaste for
politics in art and scholarship.
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Carolyn Kunin
> > To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
> > Sent: Monday, April 21, 2003 11:04 AM
> > Subject: anti-communism and Nabokov
> >
> >
> > It is sometimes difficult for Westerners, even now, to understand
anti-communism. The reasons for this are too complicated to go into, but I
would like to suggest that anyone interested in this question would do well
to look at Martin Amis' Koba the dread; Laughter and the twenty millions (I
hope I got that right). Mr Amis tries to understand this phenomenon. No one
would think of asking why Nabokov would not have wanted to meet, say, the
conductor von Karajan, whose Nazi sympathies are well known, but the
question can still arrise as to why he wouldn't want to meet Chaplin, whose
communist sympathies are also well known.
> >
> > Martin Amis, for whom Nabokov serves as a political beacon, tries to
come to terms with this problem and the book, though not without faults, is
well worth reading for anyone interested in Nabokov's political thought.
> >
> > Carolyn Kunin
>
>