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[NABOKOV-L] Query Libellula wings: Pale Fire, Ada
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Although in Sandy's posting the theme is butterflies (Art and Modernity - http://weimarart.blogspot.com/ ) one of the images reminded me of a scene in Ada connected to "circling on libellula wings" (whose first appearance, related to umbrellas, comes in Pale Fire *).
I tried to check the dreamlike creation related to a meeting with Ada in Van's wing à terre, only to be puzzled by something entirely distinct. The first reference to libellula flights appears in connection to Aqua!
We know that it is Van who is writing about his adopted mother Aqua and, therefore, he must have been the originator of such an image about how to reach Terra the Fair. However the overall intention of this connection escapes me, or its hypermnemic recurrence in a letter by Ada. Does anyone have a theory about it?
Cf. (a) Aqua's bivouacs...her real destination was Terra the Fair and thither she trusted she would fly on libellula long wings when she died...;
(b) He had prepared one of those phrases that sound right in dreams but lame in lucid life: 'I saw you circling above me on libellula wings'; he broke down on '...ula,' and fell at her feet...;
(c) Dasha, my sister-in-law...once upon a time, once upon libellula wings, not long before my marriage, she attended...one of your public lectures on dreams...
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* - "King Alfin's absent-mindedness was strangely combined with a passion for mechanical things, especially for flying apparatuses. In 1912, he managed to rise in an umbrella-like Fabre "hydroplane" and almost got drowned in the sea between Nitra and Indra. He smashed two Farmans, three Zemblan machines, and a beloved Santos Dumont Demoiselle... "
Cf. wikipedia: "The Santos-Dumont Demoiselle or Libellule ("Damselfly") was an early aircraft built in France by Brazilian aviation pioneer Alberto Santos Dumont.. It was a light-weight monoplane with a wire-braced wing mounted atop an open-framework fuselage built around a reinforced bamboo boom. The pilot's seat was below the wing, and between the main wheels of the undercarriage. The rear end of the boom carried a tailwheel and a conventional empennage."
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I tried to check the dreamlike creation related to a meeting with Ada in Van's wing à terre, only to be puzzled by something entirely distinct. The first reference to libellula flights appears in connection to Aqua!
We know that it is Van who is writing about his adopted mother Aqua and, therefore, he must have been the originator of such an image about how to reach Terra the Fair. However the overall intention of this connection escapes me, or its hypermnemic recurrence in a letter by Ada. Does anyone have a theory about it?
Cf. (a) Aqua's bivouacs...her real destination was Terra the Fair and thither she trusted she would fly on libellula long wings when she died...;
(b) He had prepared one of those phrases that sound right in dreams but lame in lucid life: 'I saw you circling above me on libellula wings'; he broke down on '...ula,' and fell at her feet...;
(c) Dasha, my sister-in-law...once upon a time, once upon libellula wings, not long before my marriage, she attended...one of your public lectures on dreams...
....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................
* - "King Alfin's absent-mindedness was strangely combined with a passion for mechanical things, especially for flying apparatuses. In 1912, he managed to rise in an umbrella-like Fabre "hydroplane" and almost got drowned in the sea between Nitra and Indra. He smashed two Farmans, three Zemblan machines, and a beloved Santos Dumont Demoiselle... "
Cf. wikipedia: "The Santos-Dumont Demoiselle or Libellule ("Damselfly") was an early aircraft built in France by Brazilian aviation pioneer Alberto Santos Dumont.. It was a light-weight monoplane with a wire-braced wing mounted atop an open-framework fuselage built around a reinforced bamboo boom. The pilot's seat was below the wing, and between the main wheels of the undercarriage. The rear end of the boom carried a tailwheel and a conventional empennage."
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/
