Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

In one of her letters to Van (written after Van left Ardis forever) Ada (the title character of a novel, 1969, by VN) mentions “the burning tip of Patagonia, Captain Grant’s Horn:”

[California? 1890]

Just before his transatlantic journey on Admiral Tobakoff Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) travels to an English floramor (one of the hundred palatial brothels built all over the world by David van Veen in memory of his grandson Eric) in a jolls-joyce (ancient limousine):

At the beginning of his poem John Shade (the poet in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962) says that he was the shadow of the waxwing slain by the false azure in the windowpane:

I was the shadow of the waxwing slain

By the false azure in the windowpane;

I was the smudge of ashen fluff - and I

Lived on, flew on, in the reflected sky. (ll. 1-4)

At the end of her letter to Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969), written a month before Demon's death in a mysterious airplane disaster above the Pacific, Ada (now married to Andrey Vinelander) mentions cretinous critics, especially lower-upper-middle-class Englishmen, who accuse Van's style of being ‘coy’ and ‘arch:’

Describing his love-making with Cordula Tobak in a drab little hotel in Paris, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions a rectangular moue (little grimace) made by Cordula:

Describing the torments of poor mad Aqua (the twin sister of Van's, Ada's and Lucette's mother Marina), Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions Caliban:

Describing his love-making with Cordula Tobak in a drab little hotel in Paris, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) compares Cordula to a child braving her first merry-go-round:

Describing his meeting with Cordula Tobak (born de Prey, Van's former mistress) in 1901, in Paris, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions the brown and green Bois de Belleau through which Van walks Cordula for a stretch in the direction of her osobnyachyok (small mansion):

After the dinner in 'Ursus' (the best Franco-Estotian restaurant in Manhattan Major) and debauch à trois with Van and Ada in Van's Manhattan flat Lucette (in VN's novel Ada, 1969, Van's and Ada's half-sister) pins to the pillow a note scrawled in Arlen Eyelid Green:

Describing the beginning of his lifelong romance with Ada, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions Ada's drawing teacher, Miss Wintergreen: