Alexey Sklyarenko:
Another mention of Nabokov-Sirin in Ehrenburg's "People, Years, Life" (Book
Three, 15):" Recognizing the talent of the budding émigré writer Nabokov-Sirin, Babel said: "He can write but has
nothing to write about." (about Proust: "A great writer. Yet, boring...
Perhaps, he too was bored to describe all this?") " Alexey Sklyarenko (who apologizes for writing about VN to the Freud
list).
JM: After Babel
tumbled, and only then, did the excitement begin because people had to find
a new way to say old things.Just like any ordinary linving entity who
must strive to surpass natural obstacles...But you are right. All that
old-fashioned Freudian thing can be boring, even to me when I try to compare
here Nabokov's Freud (crystallized in the early twenties) to Nabokov's
writings.
Maurice Couturier:
Few, if any, Nabokovians may have heard of Michel Onfray's important essay, "Le
crépuscule d'une idole. L'affabulation freudienne" (Grasset 2010) which
triggered a heated debate in France (should I say in Paris?)....an attack
against Freud as a scientist which denounces his bad faith and his incompetence
as a therapist. Some of you will be surprised to read these lines...Lacanian
psychoanalysis provides, in my opinion, a strong theory of the human psyche
which casts new light on the psychological make-up of Nabokov's characters and
contributes to a better...understanding of the unfolding of the stories
contained in his novels.
JM: I hope M.Couturier is not vindicating the use
of "Applied Psychoanalysis" to Nabokov...But I can only agree with
his very actual Parisian conclusion: Lacan's seminars and articles are
instrumental and they "cast new light" on various fields of human
understanding and "on the psychologycal make-up" of any good writer's characters
and plots.