To the List,

What pleases me about the discovery of the anatomical lemnisci, is that the dual-bicycle lemniscates are now shown to also make reference to brain anatomy, which I can now add to the other examples of brain imagery I've detected in Pale Fire, whether by coincidence or, more likely, by authorial design.

Carolyn

 

To the List,

Harry M Geduld, who writes on the history of cinema, edited The Definitive Dr. Jekyll and Mr Hyde Companion (Garland, 1983*) has apparently seen in Pale Fire something similar to what I have seen (from his Introduction, page 3) :

"Stevenson's story also endures as a landmark in the evolution of psychological fiction, anticipating the psychic conflicts of doubles or alternating personalities in such notable works as Dostoevsky's The Devils (1872), Conrad's "The Secret Sharer" (1912), and Nabokov's Pale Fire (1962).

"Written autotherapeutically in the aftermath of a nightmare, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde immediately popularized the concept of alternating personality years before Freud began publishing his first papers on psychoanalysis."     
Carolyn

* yes, one of the same Garland Companion series as is the excellent one on Nabokov