Deans, local politicians, national
statesmen, and of course the current ruler of the Golden Horde were pictured as
mascodagamas by topical humorists. (Ada, 1.30)
Mascodagamas (plural of Mascodagama, Van's stage name) rhymes
with Valdegamas. Marquès de Valdegamas (Juan-Francisco-Maria
de la Salud-Donoso-Cortes, Marquès de Valdegamas, Spanish statesman) and
masks are mentioned by Herzen in S togo berega (From the Other
Shore, 1850):
But the Marquès de Valdegamas bravely set the
soldier by the side of the priest, the guardroom next to the altar, the gospel
which remits sins beside the army manual which shoots dead for offences. The
time has come for us to sing a ‘Requiem’ or, rather, a ‘Te Deum’. This is the
end of the church and the end of the army.
At last the masks are off. (chapter VIII, "Donoso-Cortes, Marquès de Valdegamas,
and Julian, Roman Emperor")
In Gorky's The Life of Klim Samgin a
character calls Herzen krasnobay s togo berega
("phrase-monger/story-teller from the other shore"). Klim Samgin is a namesake
of Baron Klim Avidov (Marina's former lover who gave her children a set of
Flavita, 1.36). Baron Klim Avidov is an anagram of Vladimir Nabokov. In
Drugie berega ("Other Shores", the Russian version of Speak,
Memory) VN mentions Herzen, the talented author of Byloe i dumy
(Bygones and Meditations) after whom the Bolshaya Morskaya street in St.
Petersburg was renamed.
One of the first Russian émigrés, Herzen settled in London (where he
founded The Free Russian Press and published Kolokol* and
other periodicals). London is Great Britain's capital. According to
Pushkin (see my previous posts), "England is the fatherland of cartoon and
parody."
*The Bell
Alexey Sklyarenko