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Miscellaneous VN-related activities (fwd)
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From: Donald Barton Johnson <chtodel@humanitas.ucsb.edu>
Dmitri Nabokov kindly sends the following information to NABOKV-L:
1. The Spoken Arts VN reading appeared orignally as an LP, and has been
reissued in casette form.
2. The Harvard (Lamont Poetry Room) two-cassette [set], done with my
participation when I was there to read and comment on my translation of
THE ENCHANTER, is, I understand, still available. One of the interesting
things about it is the evolution of Father's American pronunciation,
sometimes in the repetition of the same piece. Another is the comparison
of his way (and mine as well) of reciting Russian with the dreadful
post-Soviet singsong that appears on the sound tracks of many Russian
films about VN and me.
3. The Paris trip went very well. I was presented a special screening, at
the kind invitation of RTL TV's president, to past and present members of
the Academie and the government, and gave more media interviews, live and
taped, than I can remember, in more languages than I can remember.
Contrary to one posting I saw, I find neither the LOLITA poster--which
smiled at me from every Morris Pillar the moment I crossed into France,
and from every Parisian bus--nor the Gallimard Folio cover in bad taste at
all.
4. Last night Adrian [Lyne] appeared on Pivot's "Bouillon de culture" in
the company of several writers. All, including Pivot, liked the new film,
with some reservations about the Guignolesque last four minutes, about
which I too have had many discussions with Adrian, in the context of
trying to stick TOO closely to a text, about which VN himself had
cautioned. I continue to find the film superb. Adrian said the right
things. The most pompus participant in the panel, whose theme was "Sex and
Morality" and whose set was adorned with phalli by Nikki de St.-Phalle
(sorry, Galya--but that's her name) claimed, from way out in left field,
that sexuality had been corrupted by capitalism and that copulation is an
act of male dominance. He apparently never tried Bolshevik
love-on-a-tractor, and I would have quickly enlightened him about the
interaction of the sexes in general. And I shall, on two longish radio
programs next week.
Dmitri Nabokov kindly sends the following information to NABOKV-L:
1. The Spoken Arts VN reading appeared orignally as an LP, and has been
reissued in casette form.
2. The Harvard (Lamont Poetry Room) two-cassette [set], done with my
participation when I was there to read and comment on my translation of
THE ENCHANTER, is, I understand, still available. One of the interesting
things about it is the evolution of Father's American pronunciation,
sometimes in the repetition of the same piece. Another is the comparison
of his way (and mine as well) of reciting Russian with the dreadful
post-Soviet singsong that appears on the sound tracks of many Russian
films about VN and me.
3. The Paris trip went very well. I was presented a special screening, at
the kind invitation of RTL TV's president, to past and present members of
the Academie and the government, and gave more media interviews, live and
taped, than I can remember, in more languages than I can remember.
Contrary to one posting I saw, I find neither the LOLITA poster--which
smiled at me from every Morris Pillar the moment I crossed into France,
and from every Parisian bus--nor the Gallimard Folio cover in bad taste at
all.
4. Last night Adrian [Lyne] appeared on Pivot's "Bouillon de culture" in
the company of several writers. All, including Pivot, liked the new film,
with some reservations about the Guignolesque last four minutes, about
which I too have had many discussions with Adrian, in the context of
trying to stick TOO closely to a text, about which VN himself had
cautioned. I continue to find the film superb. Adrian said the right
things. The most pompus participant in the panel, whose theme was "Sex and
Morality" and whose set was adorned with phalli by Nikki de St.-Phalle
(sorry, Galya--but that's her name) claimed, from way out in left field,
that sexuality had been corrupted by capitalism and that copulation is an
act of male dominance. He apparently never tried Bolshevik
love-on-a-tractor, and I would have quickly enlightened him about the
interaction of the sexes in general. And I shall, on two longish radio
programs next week.