Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0021215, Sat, 22 Jan 2011 20:32:07 -0200

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Re: ADA's skeletiki, krestik, taksik and Khristosik
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A.Sklyarenko (Jan.17): Thanks to Jeff Edmunds, "The Red Flower of Evil in Nabokov's Ada" (the English version) is now available in Zembla:
http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/redflower.doc A.Sklyarenko (Jan 22) ..."There are skeletiki in Ilya Lvovich Tolstoy's "Мои воспоминания" (My Reminiscences, 1933, chapter VII). Krestik ("little cross," a play on "little crest") is Ada's "tender-turret" word for female genitalia (2.5) ...Van is Lucette's uterine (not "vaginal," as Lucette says) brother.
The abridged English version of Ilya Tolstoy's book is available online: http://www.google.ru/url?q=http://www.free-ebooks.net/ebook/Reminiscences-of-Tolstoy&sa=U&ei=NNE5TY2gJIjN4gauqPHRCg&ved=0CDIQFjAO&usg=AFQjCNFYw1q5fa_4ErDKIGa1u5T2KZJzXg. Alas, the chapter with skeletiki and Adol'fik seems to be absent from it). I'm a tired (but happy) commentator today.

JM: Congs to Alexey for the English version of "The Red Flower of Evil..."now available in Zembla. Today's posting was also most entertaining and informative: he has a just cause to be "a happy commentator!" fluently passing from one literary association to another with no need of equations forming a mnemonic code (and a lot more).
Why did Nabokov make Lucette describe herself as Van's "vaginal" sister? Is the author indicating thereby a gender-related issue, or is Lucette simply announcing her openness towards Van's trysts and thrusts?

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