Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0006856, Sat, 28 Sep 2002 15:08:30 -0700

Subject
Fw: p.s. to my reply to Mr L.
Date
Body
----- Original Message -----
From: "Carolyn Kunin" <chaiselongue@earthlink.net>
To: "Vladimir Nabokov Forum" <NABOKV-L@listserv.ucsb.edu>
Sent: Saturday, September 28, 2002 2:38 PM
Subject: p.s. to my reply to Mr L.


>
> ----------------- Message requiring your approval (22
lines) ------------------
> p.s. I forgot the problem with the barn message. It doesn't add up. I may
be
> a crackpot, but my arithmetic is sound enough.
>
> I take Kinbote very seriously. As an alternate personality he is ignorant
of
> much, but also would know more about Shade (the relationship is the most
> intimate possible in human existence) than anyone else.
>
> He has taken advantage of John Shade's heart attack? nervous breakdown? in
> October of 1958 to make his move into Shade's consciousness. He was
> therefore privy to some, but not all, social encounters that Shade had
after
> February of 1959 when Kinbote (at first invisible), lands in New Wye. His
> descriptions of these, where he is often the center of attention, are
> certainly partially fantasy. I do not know if alternate personalities can
> have fantasy lives, I doubt it, but this is fiction and some allowances
can
> be made.
>
> Another question for my list: Why does Kinbote address a doctor in at
least
> one of the later notes? Who is he talking to?
>
> I don't accept that Nabokovian precedent has any place in solving the
riddle
> of Pale Fire. If it does, Nabokov was not as good a writer as I have
> believed.