In VN’s story Usta k ustam (“Lips to Lips,” 1931) Euphratski calls Galatov Russkiy Dzhoys (the Russian Joyce):
- Пошлите вашу вещь,- Евфратский прищурился и вполголоса докончил: - "Ариону".
- "Ариону"? - переспросил Илья Борисович, нервно погладив рукопись.
- Ничего страшного. Название журнала. Неужели не знаете? Ай-я-яй! Первая книжка вышла весной, осенью выйдет вторая. Нужно немножко следить за литературой, Илья Борисович.
- Как же так - просто послать?
- Ну да, в Париж, редактору. Уж имя-то Галатова вы, небось, знаете?
Илья Борисович виновато пожал толстым плечом. Евфратский, морщась, объяснил: беллетрист, новые формы, мастерство, сложная конструкция, русский Джойс...
- Джойс,- смиренно повторил Илья Борисович.
"Send your thing" (Euphratski narrowed his eyes and lowered his voice) "to Arion."
"Arion? What's that?" said I.B., nervously patting his manuscript.
"Nothing very frightening. It's the name of the best émigré review. You don't know it? Ay-ya-yay! The first number came out this spring, the second is expected in the fall. You should keep up with literature a bit closer, Ilya Borisovich!"
"But how to contact them? Just mail it?"
"That's right. Straight to the editor. It's published in Paris. Now don't tell me you've never heard Galatov's name?"
Guiltily Ilya Borisovich shrugged one fat shoulder. Euphratski, his face working wryly, explained: a writer, a master, new form of the novel, intricate construction, Galatov the Russian Joyce.
"Djoys," meekly repeated Ilya Borisovich after him.
The surname Galatov seems to hint at Pygmalion and Galatea mentioned by Joyce in Episode 8 ("Lestrygonians") of Ulysses (1922):
His downcast eyes followed the silent veining of the oaken slab. Beauty: it curves, curves are beauty. Shapely goddesses, Venus, Juno: curves the world admires. Can see them library museum standing in the round hall, naked goddesses. Aids to digestion. They don’t care what man looks. All to see. Never speaking, I mean to say to fellows like Flynn. Suppose she did Pygmalion and Galatea what would she say first? Mortal! Put you in your proper place. Quaffing nectar at mess with gods, golden dishes, all ambrosial. Not like a tanner lunch we have, boiled mutton, carrots and turnips, bottle of Allsop. Nectar, imagine it drinking electricity: gods’ food. Lovely forms of woman sculped Junonian. Immortal lovely. And we stuffing food in one hole and out behind: food, chyle, blood, dung, earth, food: have to feed it like stoking an engine. They have no. Never looked. I’ll look today. Keeper won’t see. Bend down let something fall see if she.
Euphratski is a journalist with a dozen pennames. One of his pseudonyms is Tigrin (Tigris):
Вернувшись домой, он бережно разрезал книжку. В ней он нашёл малопонятную вещь Галатова, два-три рассказа смутно-знакомых авторов, какие-то туманные стихи и весьма дельную статью о немецкой индустрии, подписанную "Тигрин". "Никогда не возьмут,-- с тоской подумал Илья Борисович.-- Тут своя компания".
Upon coming home, he took an ivory paperknife and neatly cut the magazine's pages. Therein he found an unintelligible piece of prose by Galatov, two or three short stories by vaguely familiar authors, a mist of poems, and an extremely capable article about German industrial problems signed Tigris.
Oh, they'll never accept it, reflected Ilya Borisovich with anguish. They all belong to one crew.
As he speaks to Ilya Borisovich over the ’phone, Galatov mentions Chyornaya pantera (“The Black Panther”), a play:
Он был счастлив. Он выписал ещё пять экземпляров. Он был счастлив. Умалчивание объяснялось косностью, придирки -- недоброжелательством. Он был счастлив. Продолжение следует. И вот, как-то в воскресенье, позвонил Евфратский:
-- Угадайте,-- сказал он,-- кто хочет с вами говорить? Галатов! Да, он приехал на пару дней.
Зазвучал незнакомый, играющий, напористый, сладкоодуряющий голос. Условились.
-- Завтра в пять часов у меня. Жалко, что не сегодня. -- Не могу,-- отвечал играющий голос.-- Меня тащат на "Чёрную Пантеру". Я кстати давно не видался с Евгенией Дмитриевной...
He was happy. He purchased six more copies. He was happy. Silence was readily explained by inertia, detraction by enmity. He was happy. "To be continued." And then, one Sunday, came a telephone call from Euphratski: "Guess," he said, "who wants to speak to you? Galatov! Yes, he's in Berlin for a couple of days. I pass the receiver."
A voice never yet heard took over. A shimmering, urgeful, mellow, narcotic voice. A meeting was settled.
"Tomorrow at five at my place," said Ilya Borisovich, "what a pity you can't come tonight!"
"Very regrettable," rejoined the shimmering voice; "you see, I'm being dragged by friends to attend The Black Panther – terrible play – but it's such a long time since I've seen dear Elena Dmitrievna."
At the beginning of Ulysses Stephen Dedalus complains to Buck Mulligan that Haines was raving all night about a black panther:
– Tell me, Mulligan, Stephen said quietly.
– Yes, my love?
– How long is Haines going to stay in this tower?
Buck Mulligan showed a shaven cheek over his right shoulder.
– God, isn’t he dreadful? he said frankly. A ponderous Saxon. He thinks you’re not a gentleman. God, these bloody English! Bursting with money and indigestion. Because he comes from Oxford. You know, Dedalus, you have the real Oxford manner. He can’t make you out. O, my name for you is the best: Kinch, the knifeblade.
He shaved warily over his chin.
– He was raving all night about a black panther, Stephen said. Where is his guncase?
– A woful lunatic! Mulligan said. Were you in a funk?
– I was, Stephen said with energy and growing fear. Out here in the dark with a man I don’t know raving and moaning to himself about shooting a black panther. You saved men from drowning. I’m not a hero, however. If he stays on here I am off. (Chapter 1)
In his review of Contemporary Notes, No. XXXIII, G. Ivanov affirms that Sirin wrote his Universitetskaya poema (“The University Poem,” 1927) in Oxford:
“Университетскую поэму” Вл. Сирина правильнее было бы назвать «гимназической». Такими вялыми ямбами, лишёнными всякого чувства стиха, на потеху одноклассников описываются в гимназиях экзамены и учителя. Делается это, нормально, не позже пятого класса. Сирин несколько опоздал, он написал свою поэму в Оксфорде.
VN’s story “Lips to Lips” is a satire on the editors of the Paris émigré review Chisla (“Numbers”), including G. Ivanov (a good poet, but a rude critic). Incidentally, in his essay V zashchitu Hodasevicha ("In Defense of Hodasevich," 1927) G. Ivanov energetically protests that Hodasevich was called by critics Arion emigratsii (the Arion of emigration):
Теперь: Арион эмиграции. Наш поэт после Блока. Наш певец...
«Арион эмиграции». О чем же поет этот «таинственный певец», суша «влажную ризу» на чужом солнце? Какую «радость» несет его песня?
Гляжу в окно — и презираю.
Гляжу в себя — презрен я сам...
...Так вьется по земле червяк,
Рассечен тяжкою лопатой.
Арион, таинственный пушкинский певец? Арион, душа пушкинской (вселенской) поэзии?