Subject
Maxim Shrayer: VN & the Jewish Theme
Date
Body
EDITOR'S NOTE. Maxim Shrayer <Shrayer-SL@hermes.bc.edu> is the author
of a recent dissertation of VN's short stories and many articles on VN and
others. His talk, abstracted below, was given as a part of the October
1996 Nabokov series at the NY Mercantile Library. See the NABOKV-L Archive
for the full program. The full text of Dmitri Nabokov's talk may be found
in THE NABOKOVIAN (#37, Fall 1996).
--------------------------------------------------
Maxim D. Shrayer (Boston College)
The Russian Emigre World and Nabokov's Jewish Theme
(Abstract of a Lecture, Delivered at the Mercantile Library of New York on
October 9, 1996)
In his novels and short stories--both of the Russian and the American
periods--Vladimir Nabokov (1899-1977) created a series of remarkable Jewish
characters. He also populated his fictions with non-Jewish characters who
exemplify the entire spectrum of Russian attitudes towards the Jews, from
anti-Semitism to Philosemitism. In fact it was in the Russian emigre
communities in Europe and America, much more so than in Russia, that Nabokov
got to know a wide variety of Jewish characters and types, from unbending
Geschaeftmacher to penniless philosophers. Nabokov's Jewish theme evolved
gradually by the middle 1930s to reach a crescendo in his third American
novel, Pnin (1957). Nabokov's Jewish characters, be they the converted Jew
Aleksandr Chernyshevskii and the protagonist's beloved Zina Mertz (both in the
Russian novel The Gift [1937-38]), or the elderly Jewish couple in the
American short story "Signs and Symbols" (1948), confront death and offer keys
to understanding its protean phenomenon. Faced with peripeties of exile and
catastrophes of the modern age, Jewish characters ponder postmortem realms and
model immortality. The deaths of Jewish characters in the Holocaust, as well
as encounters with Antisemitism in Europe and in America, compel their
non-Jewish friends to modify their ethical and metaphysical beliefs.
Maxim D. Shrayer, Ph. D.
Assistant Professor of Russian
Department of Slavic and Eastern Languages
210 Lyons Hall E-mail shrayerm@bc.edu
Boston College Voice (617) 552-3911
Chestnut Hill, MA 02167 USA Fax (617) 552-2286
________________________________________________________
To: Shrayer-SL
From: Donald Barton Johnson on 1997-Jan- 27:Mon 23.24
Subject: RE: VN & sex
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Date: Mon, 27 Jan 1997 11:55:48 -0800 (PST)
From: Donald Barton Johnson <chtodel@humanitas.ucsb.edu>
To: Shrayer-SL <Shrayer-SL@hermes.bc.edu>
Subject: RE: VN & sex
In-Reply-To: <n1357746037.82655@hermes.bc.edu>
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Dear Maxim,
Things plod along here at their usual chaotic pace. Instead of
finishing off a dozen minor projects I seem to have become fascinated with
Viktor Pelevin's 1996 _Chapaev i pustota_. Do you know Pelevin at all.
Definitely someone to watch.
I'm sending your Tamara query out. You might check with Galya
(Galya Diment <galya@u.washington.edu>) who spent a good deal of time with
Shulgina's granddaughter in 1992 and keeps in touch with her.
Could I perhaps pry from you a paragraph about your Mercantile
Bank talk? I ran across an article in an old Novyi Amerikanets or VN and
Jews. Not very informative.
D. Barton Johnson Best, Don
Department of Germanic, Slavic and Semitic Studies
Phelps Hall
University of California at Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara, CA 93106
Phone and Fax: (805) 687-1825
Home Phone: (805) 682-4618
of a recent dissertation of VN's short stories and many articles on VN and
others. His talk, abstracted below, was given as a part of the October
1996 Nabokov series at the NY Mercantile Library. See the NABOKV-L Archive
for the full program. The full text of Dmitri Nabokov's talk may be found
in THE NABOKOVIAN (#37, Fall 1996).
--------------------------------------------------
Maxim D. Shrayer (Boston College)
The Russian Emigre World and Nabokov's Jewish Theme
(Abstract of a Lecture, Delivered at the Mercantile Library of New York on
October 9, 1996)
In his novels and short stories--both of the Russian and the American
periods--Vladimir Nabokov (1899-1977) created a series of remarkable Jewish
characters. He also populated his fictions with non-Jewish characters who
exemplify the entire spectrum of Russian attitudes towards the Jews, from
anti-Semitism to Philosemitism. In fact it was in the Russian emigre
communities in Europe and America, much more so than in Russia, that Nabokov
got to know a wide variety of Jewish characters and types, from unbending
Geschaeftmacher to penniless philosophers. Nabokov's Jewish theme evolved
gradually by the middle 1930s to reach a crescendo in his third American
novel, Pnin (1957). Nabokov's Jewish characters, be they the converted Jew
Aleksandr Chernyshevskii and the protagonist's beloved Zina Mertz (both in the
Russian novel The Gift [1937-38]), or the elderly Jewish couple in the
American short story "Signs and Symbols" (1948), confront death and offer keys
to understanding its protean phenomenon. Faced with peripeties of exile and
catastrophes of the modern age, Jewish characters ponder postmortem realms and
model immortality. The deaths of Jewish characters in the Holocaust, as well
as encounters with Antisemitism in Europe and in America, compel their
non-Jewish friends to modify their ethical and metaphysical beliefs.
Maxim D. Shrayer, Ph. D.
Assistant Professor of Russian
Department of Slavic and Eastern Languages
210 Lyons Hall E-mail shrayerm@bc.edu
Boston College Voice (617) 552-3911
Chestnut Hill, MA 02167 USA Fax (617) 552-2286
________________________________________________________
To: Shrayer-SL
From: Donald Barton Johnson on 1997-Jan- 27:Mon 23.24
Subject: RE: VN & sex
RFC Header:Received: by hermes.bc.edu with ADMIN;27 Jan 1997 23:07:52 -0500
Received: from localhost by humanitas (SMI-8.6/SMI-SVR4)
id LAA02342; Mon, 27 Jan 1997 11:55:48 -0800
Date: Mon, 27 Jan 1997 11:55:48 -0800 (PST)
From: Donald Barton Johnson <chtodel@humanitas.ucsb.edu>
To: Shrayer-SL <Shrayer-SL@hermes.bc.edu>
Subject: RE: VN & sex
In-Reply-To: <n1357746037.82655@hermes.bc.edu>
Message-ID: <Pine.SOL.3.95.970127114849.25360H-100000@humanitas.ucsb.edu>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Dear Maxim,
Things plod along here at their usual chaotic pace. Instead of
finishing off a dozen minor projects I seem to have become fascinated with
Viktor Pelevin's 1996 _Chapaev i pustota_. Do you know Pelevin at all.
Definitely someone to watch.
I'm sending your Tamara query out. You might check with Galya
(Galya Diment <galya@u.washington.edu>) who spent a good deal of time with
Shulgina's granddaughter in 1992 and keeps in touch with her.
Could I perhaps pry from you a paragraph about your Mercantile
Bank talk? I ran across an article in an old Novyi Amerikanets or VN and
Jews. Not very informative.
D. Barton Johnson Best, Don
Department of Germanic, Slavic and Semitic Studies
Phelps Hall
University of California at Santa Barbara
Santa Barbara, CA 93106
Phone and Fax: (805) 687-1825
Home Phone: (805) 682-4618