NABOKV-L discussion

It seems the big literary debut of 2020 (signed for 7 figures!) will be a novel by Kate Elizabeth Russell, called My Dark Vanessa. While the title is clearly borrowed from Pale Fire, the content is Lolita-esque, as it concerns a 15-year-old's sexual affair with a much older English teacher (it's always the English teachers). I'm including an article link and a screenshot taken from the author's Twitter page (notice her Twitter handle, also a Lolita reference).

https://ew.com/books/2018/12/11/my-dark-vanessa-acquisition-news/

How often do we find an error and then stop, once the problem is solved?

[See Attached - 6 pp.]

Marina asked Van: "But girls - do you like girls, Van, do you have any girls? You are not a pederast, like your poor uncle, are you? We have had some dreadful perverts in our ancestry but - Why do you laugh?" (p. 246 | McGraw-Hill 1969)

Boyd shared in the Ada online annotations: “[Uncle] Dan’s sexual urges, although rarely satisfyingly fulfilled, extend in numerous directions: toward his daughter Lucette, for instance [...]”

I offer the following not to make any definite claims, but as intriguing to ponder…

Nabokov references Lolita and Pnin in Pale Fire. “Hurricane Lolita” sweeping the nation is a cagey and clever self-reference, but the appearance of Professor Pnin has struck me as a bit heavy handed – why introduce this character from another book who has no real purpose except to be a character from another book?

Pour a cool one down your brain.

(See Attached)

“These aren’t the droids you’re looking for.”

See Attached. 3 pages.

Ce conifère jamais n'est mort,—
Même en hiver
Au nord, au nord, au nord, au nord, au nord
C'est vert, c'est vert, c'est vert, c'est vert, c'est vert.

I wrote the above poem over the winter break, and thought I should finally share it. It's a perversion of Nabokov's "never-never" poem in Ada. I'm especially happy that the last line's multilingual pun survived. Here's the original:

Here is a link to an article I was asked by the New Zealand Listener to write on Lolita, the #Me-Too world, and Sarah Weinman's The Real Lolita. For the likely audience I couldn't assume much prior knowledge of Nabokov or Lolita. 

Brian Boyd

1 Name in 2 Words that works on 7 Levels.

See Attachments.

Here’s some word play I have noticed in Pale Fire:

Life Everlasting – based on a misprint! (poem 803)

MISPRINT = SPIRIT + MN

“Life Everlasting” means “spirit” and is found in the word “misprint”. Misprints appear to be important clues in PF for connecting themes and plot solutions and “correlated pattern in the game”.