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[NABOKOV-L] Hoffman's Berklinger and TOoL
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While reading E.T.A Hoffmann's "Des Vetters Eckfenster," his last work, I was reminded of Nabokov's preamble to "Laura"*.
Hoffman's story carries strong autobiographical references, authorial self-quotes and it consists of a dialogue between two cousins, one of them ailing from digestive complaints, weak and painful feet and legs. The sick man was occasionaly transported from his bed to a window so that he could to watch the Berliner market-place from his vantage point. The story begins with its narrator comparing his cousin's illness to one which struck a physically paralised, mentally active Paul Scarron. Through this French writer (1610-1660) Hoffmann inserts a reference to one of his novels with the story of a painter called Berklinger ( from "Der Artushof"), who used to stand for hours in front of an almost empty canvas on which only a neutral background had been painted. Delirious Berklinger would proudly display the canvas to his visitors, instructing them about the lavish scenes and marvellous details it contained. Hoffmann also quotes one of his favorite lines from Hamlet (Act II, scene two): "So as a painted tyrant Pyrrhus stood,/ And like a neutral to his will and matter/ Did nothing" with its hint about the distance that distinguishes an original fancy from reality.
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* - Nabokov mentions his ... "not quite finished manuscript of a novel which I had begun writing and reworking before my illness and which was completed in my mind." and informs that he "kept reading it aloud to a small dream audience in a walled garden. My audience consisted of peacocks, pigeons, my long dead parents, two cypresses, several young nurses crouching around, and a family doctor so old as to be almost invisible."
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Hoffman's story carries strong autobiographical references, authorial self-quotes and it consists of a dialogue between two cousins, one of them ailing from digestive complaints, weak and painful feet and legs. The sick man was occasionaly transported from his bed to a window so that he could to watch the Berliner market-place from his vantage point. The story begins with its narrator comparing his cousin's illness to one which struck a physically paralised, mentally active Paul Scarron. Through this French writer (1610-1660) Hoffmann inserts a reference to one of his novels with the story of a painter called Berklinger ( from "Der Artushof"), who used to stand for hours in front of an almost empty canvas on which only a neutral background had been painted. Delirious Berklinger would proudly display the canvas to his visitors, instructing them about the lavish scenes and marvellous details it contained. Hoffmann also quotes one of his favorite lines from Hamlet (Act II, scene two): "So as a painted tyrant Pyrrhus stood,/ And like a neutral to his will and matter/ Did nothing" with its hint about the distance that distinguishes an original fancy from reality.
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* - Nabokov mentions his ... "not quite finished manuscript of a novel which I had begun writing and reworking before my illness and which was completed in my mind." and informs that he "kept reading it aloud to a small dream audience in a walled garden. My audience consisted of peacocks, pigeons, my long dead parents, two cypresses, several young nurses crouching around, and a family doctor so old as to be almost invisible."
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/