Stan K-B [to Gary Lipon] “for those unconvinced by possible physiognomical resemblances between Ginsberg and Kinbote, I offer tentative but plausible support for your suggested model: ALLAN GINSBERG = LENINšS GRAB LAG. Here, Lenin is an obvious symbol for the Zemblan revolutionary regime overthrowing and hunting down King Charles/Kinbote….both the delay and ultimate failure in assassinating Kinbote are clearly embedded in the phrase grab lag. QED.”
JM: Mathematicians and linguists can conglomerate any kind of grab lag - just like Nabokov! Cf. Brian Boyd (AY, p.332): “One cannot compress into a single English word as much information as Nabokov often has at his disposal about a particular word in Pushkin, and then expect the English-speaking reader to infer correctly, say, that “scrab” has been chosen not because its Russian counterpart is a dialect word for “grab” but because the original term fuses Russian verbs for “snatch” and “scratch.”* Nabokov’s diligence in searching so widely for words so exactly right would be exemplary provided he explained in every case in a separate prose gloss just why he had to forage so far.”
* - from dialect “tsapat”(to snatch), and “tsarapat” (to scratch) to render Pushkin’s Russian “tsaptsarap” as “scrab up,” by linking “grab” and “snatch.” (VN)
btw: Lewis’ transmongrelizers take us only as far as the Bandersnatch. There’s no scratch of gander or banter.