In a message dated 22/04/2005 01:55:17 GMT Standard Time, chtodel@gss.ucsb.edu writes:

Dear List and Anthony Stadlen,

Nabokov never ceases to surprise us and show how inattentive one can be. I saw
Kubrick´s movie several times and never noticed the   "hunted enchanters"
inversion. Would Nabokov have suggested it? You say it was not in his
screen-play.


Dear Jansy and List,

I forget now whether the hotel was referred to in speech in the film as "The Hunted Enchanters", but I think it probably was. I know that it was not referred to in speech as "The Enchanted Hunters" (I specifically checked for this). I also know that there was a large, clearly visible written sign for the hotel naming it as "The Hunted Enchanters".

I also know that in his published screenplay the hotel is named, as in the novel, "The Enchanted Hunters".

At the time I did suspect that this was VN's little joke, perhaps about himself being an "enchanter" (as he said a novelist should be) who was "hunted" by the press, Kubrick, etc. It seemed, if so, just a little off as the hotel was the scene of HH's sordid seduction of Lolita ("she seduced me"). And all the more so when one considers the title of his subsequently published novella. But perhaps I am too priggish.

Anthony Stadlen