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[NABOKOV-L] Whims and Megrims and their shadows
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Trifling away, here is the link bt. "whims and megrims," mentioned in yesterday's posting to Nab-L.
It was extracted from Nabokov's introduction to "Bend Sinister".
"The main theme of Bend Sinister, then, is the beating of Krug's loving heart, the torture an intense tenderness is subjected to - and it is for the sake of the pages about David and his father that the book was written and should be read. Two other themes accompany the main one: the theme of dim-brained brutality which thwarts its own purpose by destroying the right child and keeping the wrong one; and the theme of Krug's blessed madness when he suddenly perceives the simple reality of things and knows but cannot express in the words of his world that he and his son and wife and everybody else are merely my whims and megrims."
Nabokov rendered the problem related to "incommunicability" in a very clever Nabokov-God way. Like the character in "Cloud Castle Lake," who toils with philistinism and stereotypes, Krug ("circle") is dismissed, although the reader is still stuck with Nabokov and his novel.
A few weeks ago I searched for an easy-to-copy Nabokov sentence in the internet, but found another one that I couldn't place which was news to me.
I remembered this chance encounter now, for it's spirit is similar to the sentence I've just underlined from BS's preface.
Here it is: "Our imagination flies -- we are its shadow on the earth."
- Vladimir Nabokov
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It was extracted from Nabokov's introduction to "Bend Sinister".
"The main theme of Bend Sinister, then, is the beating of Krug's loving heart, the torture an intense tenderness is subjected to - and it is for the sake of the pages about David and his father that the book was written and should be read. Two other themes accompany the main one: the theme of dim-brained brutality which thwarts its own purpose by destroying the right child and keeping the wrong one; and the theme of Krug's blessed madness when he suddenly perceives the simple reality of things and knows but cannot express in the words of his world that he and his son and wife and everybody else are merely my whims and megrims."
Nabokov rendered the problem related to "incommunicability" in a very clever Nabokov-God way. Like the character in "Cloud Castle Lake," who toils with philistinism and stereotypes, Krug ("circle") is dismissed, although the reader is still stuck with Nabokov and his novel.
A few weeks ago I searched for an easy-to-copy Nabokov sentence in the internet, but found another one that I couldn't place which was news to me.
I remembered this chance encounter now, for it's spirit is similar to the sentence I've just underlined from BS's preface.
Here it is: "Our imagination flies -- we are its shadow on the earth."
- Vladimir Nabokov
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/