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Re: [Fwd: Fetching Jewels From The Deep ....]]
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Arnie Perlstein: [In his lecture on Charles Dickens Nabokov refers to an example of "oblique description of speech...which, in turn, reminds me of the paragraph in which Nabokov introduces Jane Austen's introductions...] "Is that a question as to whether Nabokov writing about Austen's writing in a way that resonates to something he wrote in Ada could be just a coincidence? Perhaps if there were quotations of the respective excerpts, we might be able to make that judgment."
JM: Ada, or Ardor: " 'I deduce,' said the boy, 'three main facts: that not yet married Marina and her. married sister hibernated in my lieu de naissance; that Marina had her own Dr Krolik, pour ainsi dire; and that the orchids came from Demon who preferred to stay by the sea, his dark-blue great-grandmother'." [...]
"Dr Krolik, our local naturalist, to whom you, Van, have referred, as Jane Austen might have phrased it, for the sake of rapid narrative information (you recall Brown, don't you, Smith?), has determined the example I brought back from Sacramento to Ardis, as the Bear-Foot, B,E,A,R, my love, not my foot or yours, or the Stabian flower girl's - an allusion, which your father, who, according to Blanche, is also mine, would understand like this' (American finger-snap)."
Nabokov's example, from Charles Dickens, dwells on a girl named Ada*. In his novel "Ada," an entire paragraph seems to employ "oblique descriptions of speech...to speed up or to concentrate a mood" (he'd exemplified with CD's Ada), like Austen's "rapid narrative information" (now used to bring up Dr. Krolik in connection to a Dr. Lapiner.)
.........................................................................................................................................................................
* - The entire example (Bowers, p.114-123) Oblique Description of Speech: "This is a further development of Samuel Johnson and Jane Austen's manner, with a greater number of samples of speech within the description...(It) is frequently used, in less eccentric characters, to speed up or to concentrate a mood, sometimes accompanied, as here, by lyrical repetition: Esther is persuading the secretly married Ada to go with her to visit Richard: " 'My dear,' said I, ' you have not had any difference with Richard since I have been so much away?'
" 'No, Esther.'
" 'Not heard of him, perhaps?' said I.
" 'Yes, I have heard of him,' said Ada.
"Such tears in her eyes and such love in her face. I could not make my darling out. Should I go to Richard's by myself? I said. No, Ada thought I had better not go by myself. Would she go with me? Yes, Ada thought she had better go with me. Should we go now? Yes, let us go now. Well, I could not understand my darling, with the tears in her eyes and the love in her face!"
** - 8.30-31 as the Bear-Foot . . . not my foot or yours, or the Stabian flower girl's
The so-called "Primavera" by Stabiae in the national Museum of Naples. See Figure B. (Cf. vnjapan.org/main/ada/ada1.html )
Ada's reference to the Stabian girl's FEET reminded me of a bas-relief that was one of Freud's favorites, the Gradiva (Latin: The woman who walks) "a neo-Attic Roman bas-relief in the manner of Greek works of the fourth century BCE, depicting a young robed woman who lifts the hems of her skirts to stride forward. The relief is in the Vatican Museums.This sculpture was the basis for the 1903 novel Gradiva by German writer Wilhelm Jensen. Sigmund Freud famously analysed the novel...in his 1907 study ("Der Wahn und die Träume in W. Jensens Gradiva", 1907, or in translation: "Delusion and Dream in W. Jensen's 'Gradiva'"), a unique example of his psychoanalysing a fictional character. Freud interpreted Hanhold's fetish as being a substitution for unresolved feelings for his childhood playmate, Zoe Bertgang [i.e: Gradiva]. Freud owned a copy of this relief, which he joyfully beheld in the Vatican Museums in 1907; it can be found on the wall of his study (the room where he died) in 20 Maresfield Gardens, London-now the Freud Museum.Salvador Dalí used the name "Gradiva" as a nickname for his wife, Gala Dalí....(wikipedia). Feet and shoes are ever present references in "Ada" (and in other VN's novels, particularly in TT and Pnin).
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JM: Ada, or Ardor: " 'I deduce,' said the boy, 'three main facts: that not yet married Marina and her. married sister hibernated in my lieu de naissance; that Marina had her own Dr Krolik, pour ainsi dire; and that the orchids came from Demon who preferred to stay by the sea, his dark-blue great-grandmother'." [...]
"Dr Krolik, our local naturalist, to whom you, Van, have referred, as Jane Austen might have phrased it, for the sake of rapid narrative information (you recall Brown, don't you, Smith?), has determined the example I brought back from Sacramento to Ardis, as the Bear-Foot, B,E,A,R, my love, not my foot or yours, or the Stabian flower girl's - an allusion, which your father, who, according to Blanche, is also mine, would understand like this' (American finger-snap)."
Nabokov's example, from Charles Dickens, dwells on a girl named Ada*. In his novel "Ada," an entire paragraph seems to employ "oblique descriptions of speech...to speed up or to concentrate a mood" (he'd exemplified with CD's Ada), like Austen's "rapid narrative information" (now used to bring up Dr. Krolik in connection to a Dr. Lapiner.)
.........................................................................................................................................................................
* - The entire example (Bowers, p.114-123) Oblique Description of Speech: "This is a further development of Samuel Johnson and Jane Austen's manner, with a greater number of samples of speech within the description...(It) is frequently used, in less eccentric characters, to speed up or to concentrate a mood, sometimes accompanied, as here, by lyrical repetition: Esther is persuading the secretly married Ada to go with her to visit Richard: " 'My dear,' said I, ' you have not had any difference with Richard since I have been so much away?'
" 'No, Esther.'
" 'Not heard of him, perhaps?' said I.
" 'Yes, I have heard of him,' said Ada.
"Such tears in her eyes and such love in her face. I could not make my darling out. Should I go to Richard's by myself? I said. No, Ada thought I had better not go by myself. Would she go with me? Yes, Ada thought she had better go with me. Should we go now? Yes, let us go now. Well, I could not understand my darling, with the tears in her eyes and the love in her face!"
** - 8.30-31 as the Bear-Foot . . . not my foot or yours, or the Stabian flower girl's
The so-called "Primavera" by Stabiae in the national Museum of Naples. See Figure B. (Cf. vnjapan.org/main/ada/ada1.html )
Ada's reference to the Stabian girl's FEET reminded me of a bas-relief that was one of Freud's favorites, the Gradiva (Latin: The woman who walks) "a neo-Attic Roman bas-relief in the manner of Greek works of the fourth century BCE, depicting a young robed woman who lifts the hems of her skirts to stride forward. The relief is in the Vatican Museums.This sculpture was the basis for the 1903 novel Gradiva by German writer Wilhelm Jensen. Sigmund Freud famously analysed the novel...in his 1907 study ("Der Wahn und die Träume in W. Jensens Gradiva", 1907, or in translation: "Delusion and Dream in W. Jensen's 'Gradiva'"), a unique example of his psychoanalysing a fictional character. Freud interpreted Hanhold's fetish as being a substitution for unresolved feelings for his childhood playmate, Zoe Bertgang [i.e: Gradiva]. Freud owned a copy of this relief, which he joyfully beheld in the Vatican Museums in 1907; it can be found on the wall of his study (the room where he died) in 20 Maresfield Gardens, London-now the Freud Museum.Salvador Dalí used the name "Gradiva" as a nickname for his wife, Gala Dalí....(wikipedia). Feet and shoes are ever present references in "Ada" (and in other VN's novels, particularly in TT and Pnin).
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/