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Re: Appendix to Bunny, Judy, & Volodya?
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"Another thing that might have been of some help is the fact that I am subject to the embarrassing qualms of superstition: a number, a dream, a coincidence can affect me obsessively-- though not in the sense of absurd fears but as fabulous (and on the whole rather bracing) scientific enigmas incapable of being stated, let alone solved." (.Nabokov's interview.The New York Times,1971, to Alden Whitman.)
The redundant quotes from today's batch of postings has been organized to illustrate coincident themes, intertwined references and extraordinary natural occurrences:
!. Carolyn Kunin [ to JM's reference to "The Strange Case of Pushkin and Nabokov" by Edmund Wilson] "Hmm - only just now noticing the interesting title EW chose for his critique of VN's EO."
Brian Boyd:"...Nabokov's instruction to his students, in the second paragraph of his Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde lecture: 'First of all, if you have the Pocket Books edition I have, you will veil the monstrous, abominable, criminal, foul, vile, youth-depraving jacket--or better say straitjacket. ...; it seems to me that to call a movie house a theatre is the same as to call an undertaker a mortician'." (Lectures on Literature 179)
2. JM:"The English writer Graham Greene cited it [Lolita] among the best books of 1955. Edmund Wilson, Evelyn Waugh, and E.M. Forster did not share his view"
Carolyn Kunin [on Shirley Temple and Graham Greene's review] "The film was Wee Willie Winkie and GG's review, this time in Night and Day, was considered so shocking at the time that it could not be read aloud in open court... '... already two years ago she [Miss Temple] was a fancy little piece ... watch the way she measures a man with agile studio eyes, with dimpled depravity. Adult emotions of love and grief glissade across the mask of childhood ... middle-aged men and clergy-men respond to her dubious coquetry, to the sight of her well-shaped and desirable little body ....'A lawsuit ensues and lawyers for the studio and Little Miss L's parents proclaim the offending magazine 'a beastly publication'.[ ] Mrs B quotes GG referring to her as 'that little bitch Shirley Temple.' He had no idea who he was dealing with. I don't think HH ever figured it out either."
However, below we find the most striking curiosity
3. Dr. Kurt Johnson, "co-author of Nabokov's Blues, retired lepidopterist from the American Museum of Natural History. [ ] In Nabokov-lore, the numeral-like underwing pattern of this species [ Red Admiral] and the reported occurrence of such an outbreak in Russia supposedly had some fateful parallel with the dates of the Russian revolution...Well, in the last two days we have had an outbreak of Red Admirals in NYC the likes of which I have never seen (not even close) and I've been here 45 years[ ]One would have to account for why there are so many of them in this year's spring brood if nothing last year seemed unusual. / Well, I thought this note might be useful re: the Nabokov lore about that report of incidents of Red Admiral breakouts in Russia at the time of the revolution. I was surprised today; never seen anything like it."
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The redundant quotes from today's batch of postings has been organized to illustrate coincident themes, intertwined references and extraordinary natural occurrences:
!. Carolyn Kunin [ to JM's reference to "The Strange Case of Pushkin and Nabokov" by Edmund Wilson] "Hmm - only just now noticing the interesting title EW chose for his critique of VN's EO."
Brian Boyd:"...Nabokov's instruction to his students, in the second paragraph of his Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde lecture: 'First of all, if you have the Pocket Books edition I have, you will veil the monstrous, abominable, criminal, foul, vile, youth-depraving jacket--or better say straitjacket. ...; it seems to me that to call a movie house a theatre is the same as to call an undertaker a mortician'." (Lectures on Literature 179)
2. JM:"The English writer Graham Greene cited it [Lolita] among the best books of 1955. Edmund Wilson, Evelyn Waugh, and E.M. Forster did not share his view"
Carolyn Kunin [on Shirley Temple and Graham Greene's review] "The film was Wee Willie Winkie and GG's review, this time in Night and Day, was considered so shocking at the time that it could not be read aloud in open court... '... already two years ago she [Miss Temple] was a fancy little piece ... watch the way she measures a man with agile studio eyes, with dimpled depravity. Adult emotions of love and grief glissade across the mask of childhood ... middle-aged men and clergy-men respond to her dubious coquetry, to the sight of her well-shaped and desirable little body ....'A lawsuit ensues and lawyers for the studio and Little Miss L's parents proclaim the offending magazine 'a beastly publication'.[ ] Mrs B quotes GG referring to her as 'that little bitch Shirley Temple.' He had no idea who he was dealing with. I don't think HH ever figured it out either."
However, below we find the most striking curiosity
3. Dr. Kurt Johnson, "co-author of Nabokov's Blues, retired lepidopterist from the American Museum of Natural History. [ ] In Nabokov-lore, the numeral-like underwing pattern of this species [ Red Admiral] and the reported occurrence of such an outbreak in Russia supposedly had some fateful parallel with the dates of the Russian revolution...Well, in the last two days we have had an outbreak of Red Admirals in NYC the likes of which I have never seen (not even close) and I've been here 45 years[ ]One would have to account for why there are so many of them in this year's spring brood if nothing last year seemed unusual. / Well, I thought this note might be useful re: the Nabokov lore about that report of incidents of Red Admiral breakouts in Russia at the time of the revolution. I was surprised today; never seen anything like it."
Search archive with Google:
http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=site:listserv.ucsb.edu&HL=en
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Visit "Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
Manage subscription options: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/