Subject
[TRIVIA- QUERY] He,she, it... Gold, silver,
copper: fairy-tale themes?
copper: fairy-tale themes?
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In one of his lectures at Cornell in 1951 V. Nabokov remarked to his
students that "the caterpillar is a he , the pupa is it and the butterfly is
she."
(Cf. <http://factsanddetails.com/world/cat52/sub333/item1594.html>
http://factsanddetails.com/world/cat52/sub333/item1594.html)
An earlier comment, voiced by Hermann in "Despair" plays with another
threesome: "The weighty German word for "money" (money in German being gold,
in French, silver, in Russian, copper) was mouthed by him."
I ignore how many similar approximations can be spotted in Nabokov's
writings (I only found these two), or if they should be placed side by side
as deliberate indications of fairy-tale "threes."
Even when they are evaluated independently from this hypothesis, they retain
their humoristic mood. Hermann's observation is not discrepant from a madman
ratiocination but VN's sentence about the "gender" of lepidoptera expressed
during class is rather surprising.
Thoughts?
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Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
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Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
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The Nabokov Society of Japan's Annotations to Ada: http://vnjapan.org/main/ada/index.html
The VN Bibliography Blog: http://vnbiblio.com/
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students that "the caterpillar is a he , the pupa is it and the butterfly is
she."
(Cf. <http://factsanddetails.com/world/cat52/sub333/item1594.html>
http://factsanddetails.com/world/cat52/sub333/item1594.html)
An earlier comment, voiced by Hermann in "Despair" plays with another
threesome: "The weighty German word for "money" (money in German being gold,
in French, silver, in Russian, copper) was mouthed by him."
I ignore how many similar approximations can be spotted in Nabokov's
writings (I only found these two), or if they should be placed side by side
as deliberate indications of fairy-tale "threes."
Even when they are evaluated independently from this hypothesis, they retain
their humoristic mood. Hermann's observation is not discrepant from a madman
ratiocination but VN's sentence about the "gender" of lepidoptera expressed
during class is rather surprising.
Thoughts?
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
Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
AdaOnline: "http://www.ada.auckland.ac.nz/
The Nabokov Society of Japan's Annotations to Ada: http://vnjapan.org/main/ada/index.html
The VN Bibliography Blog: http://vnbiblio.com/
Search the archive with L-Soft: https://listserv.ucsb.edu/lsv-cgi-bin/wa?A0=NABOKV-L
Manage subscription options :http://listserv.ucsb.edu/lsv-cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=NABOKV-L