Given Nabokov's stated aversion to influences German and
Freudian, I was amused to learn via "The Kibitzer" at
http://www.chesscafe.com that one model for
a certain defenestrated protagonist may be doubly qualified:
“'Poetic ideals'
"In 1893, Von Bardeleben’s book Die Wiener Partie [Eine
Schach-Theoretische Abhandlung, i.e., The Vienna Game: A Chess-Theoretic
Treatise] was published in Leipzig. It summed up roughly the first half century
of experience with the Vienna Game, which had really sprung from the games of
Hofrat Hampe (1814-76) and his contemporaries.
"In his introduction, Von Bardeleben lamented that the
theoretical investigation of gambit play nowadays has a rather academic
character, because theory deals so much with traps that in practice rarely, if
ever, happen any more, e.g. the Allgaier, Muzio and Kieseritrsky [sic] Gambits.
These gambits, he wrote, are the poetic ideals, but practical chess play is
sober and unpoetic."
Curt von Bardeleben also co-authored a "Textbook on
Chess-Playing" with Jacques Mieses; the latter machine-translates as "bad
Jacques", but that's a different story ...
;D