Subject
[NABOKOV-L] Botkin again and several queries
Date
Body
One of the references to Botkin, by Kinbote, is when he includes it in a list of surnames that indicate a profession*.
Botkin emerges, as a surname, in a commentary related to Shade's parents, his mother in particular, while we wade through the typical self-referential passage that leads from Shade's family onto King Charles's own. Is this suggestive of Shade/Kinbote's blenda into one?
btw: (1) Hamlet's bare Danish stiletto here not only refers to Kinbote, but is part of assorted links with Denmark, things danish and, even, Gradus' first landing spot after he left Onhava to cross over to the States); (2) What kind of blood-relation is there between faithful Odon, treacherous Nodo and Oleg, through G.Rahl and Sylvia O'Donnell?
Cf. Note to lines 71/72
"The poet's mother, nee Caroline Lukin, assisted him in his work and drew the admirable figures of his Birds of Mexico, which I remember having seen in my friend's house. What the obituarist does not know is that Lukin comes from Luke, as also do Locock and Luxon and Lukashevich. It represents one of the many instances when the amorphous-looking but live and personal hereditary patronymic grows, sometimes in fantastic shapes, around the common pebble of a Christian name. The Lukins are an old Essex family. Other names derive from professions such as Rymer, Scrivener, Limner (one who illuminates parchments), Botkin (one who makes bottekins, fancy footwear) and thousands of others. My tutor, a Scotsman, used to call any old tumble-down building "a hurley-house." But enough of this."
The Botkin Index entry ackowledges this reference:
Botkin, V., American scholar of Russian descent, 894; king-bot, maggot of extinct fly that once bred in mammoths and is thought to have hastened their phylogenetic end, 247; bottekin-maker, 71; bot, plop, and botelïy, big-bellied (Russ.); botkin or bodkin, a Danish stiletto.
* Any link to the Spanish Inquisition and the New Christians who altered their names?
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Botkin emerges, as a surname, in a commentary related to Shade's parents, his mother in particular, while we wade through the typical self-referential passage that leads from Shade's family onto King Charles's own. Is this suggestive of Shade/Kinbote's blenda into one?
btw: (1) Hamlet's bare Danish stiletto here not only refers to Kinbote, but is part of assorted links with Denmark, things danish and, even, Gradus' first landing spot after he left Onhava to cross over to the States); (2) What kind of blood-relation is there between faithful Odon, treacherous Nodo and Oleg, through G.Rahl and Sylvia O'Donnell?
Cf. Note to lines 71/72
"The poet's mother, nee Caroline Lukin, assisted him in his work and drew the admirable figures of his Birds of Mexico, which I remember having seen in my friend's house. What the obituarist does not know is that Lukin comes from Luke, as also do Locock and Luxon and Lukashevich. It represents one of the many instances when the amorphous-looking but live and personal hereditary patronymic grows, sometimes in fantastic shapes, around the common pebble of a Christian name. The Lukins are an old Essex family. Other names derive from professions such as Rymer, Scrivener, Limner (one who illuminates parchments), Botkin (one who makes bottekins, fancy footwear) and thousands of others. My tutor, a Scotsman, used to call any old tumble-down building "a hurley-house." But enough of this."
The Botkin Index entry ackowledges this reference:
Botkin, V., American scholar of Russian descent, 894; king-bot, maggot of extinct fly that once bred in mammoths and is thought to have hastened their phylogenetic end, 247; bottekin-maker, 71; bot, plop, and botelïy, big-bellied (Russ.); botkin or bodkin, a Danish stiletto.
* Any link to the Spanish Inquisition and the New Christians who altered their names?
Search archive with Google:
http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=site:listserv.ucsb.edu&HL=en
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Visit "Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
Manage subscription options: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/