Subject
Query: VN and Pale Fire, Martin Gardner and Annotated Alice
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Does anyone know whether Nabokov had read “The Annotated Alice” (Alice
through the looking glass and adventures in Wonderland with notes and
introduction by Martin Gardner, amongst other things a US popular Science
writer) and whether this was an influence on his structure for Pale Fire
and possibly some of the themes e.g. mirror worlds? I noted some of the
similarities at an evening class studying Pale Fire.
Circumstantial evidence includes the following.
The Annotated Alice was published in the USA in 1960 (by Clarkson N.
Potter Inc) only 2 years before Pale Fire was first published in the USA
in 1962. .
Nabokov had a known interest in Alice having translated the books into
Russian as a young man (see this web site) and so might reasonably have
been expected to be interested in the annotated version.
Martin Gardner’s introduction to the Annotated Alice actually refers to
comparisons between Humbert Humbert (Lolita) and Caroll strengthening the
chance that the publication might have come or been brought to the
attention of Nabokov.
The annotations are extensive (comparable to the size of the original
text) and arguably the distinct voice of the annotator is an integral
part of the overall publication . Could this have initiated Nabokov’s
innovative structure for Pale Fire?
Gardner’s introduction strikes me as almost Nabokovian in tone: “the last
level of metaphor in the Alice books is this: life viewed rationally and
without illusion appears to be a nonsense tale told by an idiot
mathematician”.. “for a moment the waves and particles dance in grotesque,
inconceivably complex patterns capable of reflecting on their own
absurdity”. There is a reference in the introduction to God in
Chesterton’s The Man who was Thursday who “flings little messages to his
pursuers” but “they turn out to be nonsense messages” - sounds a similar
theme to the white fountain/mountain and the prophetic clock work gardener
(punning hidden ref to Martin Gardner?) in Pale Fire?
Clearly the whole area of mirrors, reflections and the separation of
worlds by glass are common themes to Alice through the Looking Glass and
Pale Fire. There is a red king in both (Kinbote makes his escape from
Zembla in red). The red king’s dream (Alice) is a Pale Fire theme of who
is dreaming who (Alice or red king; Kinbote or Shade) - Gardner’s note
refers to “an odd sort of infinite regress involved here in the parallel
dreams “ … “like two mirrors facing each other”.
Finally there is hard evidence, as explained on the Zembla web site,
that Nabokov and Gardner came to be aware of each other. Gardner wrote a
book (which I have to admit I have not yet read) called the Ambidextrous
Universe about mirror symmetries in nature (sounds like something from a
Nobokov novel to start with) which includes a quotation from the poet
John Shade without acknowledgement of fictional status and
subsequently Nabokov’s Ada or Ador cites this work referring to
the “invented philosopher (“Martin Gardner”)” .
To me the above seems quite convincing on a circumstantial basis but is
there hard evidence that Nabokov had in fact read the Annotated Alice
before writing Pale Fire and if so whether it influenced his thinking? I
would be really interested in this or views on plausibility.
Owen Crawley
[EDNOTE. The VN - MG connection is worth exploring further, although there were certainly more immediate and fundamental influences for VN's thinking about annotating works of literature, including his own commentary on Pushkin's Eugene Onegin. -- SES]
Search the archive: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/archives/nabokv-l.html
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
through the looking glass and adventures in Wonderland with notes and
introduction by Martin Gardner, amongst other things a US popular Science
writer) and whether this was an influence on his structure for Pale Fire
and possibly some of the themes e.g. mirror worlds? I noted some of the
similarities at an evening class studying Pale Fire.
Circumstantial evidence includes the following.
The Annotated Alice was published in the USA in 1960 (by Clarkson N.
Potter Inc) only 2 years before Pale Fire was first published in the USA
in 1962. .
Nabokov had a known interest in Alice having translated the books into
Russian as a young man (see this web site) and so might reasonably have
been expected to be interested in the annotated version.
Martin Gardner’s introduction to the Annotated Alice actually refers to
comparisons between Humbert Humbert (Lolita) and Caroll strengthening the
chance that the publication might have come or been brought to the
attention of Nabokov.
The annotations are extensive (comparable to the size of the original
text) and arguably the distinct voice of the annotator is an integral
part of the overall publication . Could this have initiated Nabokov’s
innovative structure for Pale Fire?
Gardner’s introduction strikes me as almost Nabokovian in tone: “the last
level of metaphor in the Alice books is this: life viewed rationally and
without illusion appears to be a nonsense tale told by an idiot
mathematician”.. “for a moment the waves and particles dance in grotesque,
inconceivably complex patterns capable of reflecting on their own
absurdity”. There is a reference in the introduction to God in
Chesterton’s The Man who was Thursday who “flings little messages to his
pursuers” but “they turn out to be nonsense messages” - sounds a similar
theme to the white fountain/mountain and the prophetic clock work gardener
(punning hidden ref to Martin Gardner?) in Pale Fire?
Clearly the whole area of mirrors, reflections and the separation of
worlds by glass are common themes to Alice through the Looking Glass and
Pale Fire. There is a red king in both (Kinbote makes his escape from
Zembla in red). The red king’s dream (Alice) is a Pale Fire theme of who
is dreaming who (Alice or red king; Kinbote or Shade) - Gardner’s note
refers to “an odd sort of infinite regress involved here in the parallel
dreams “ … “like two mirrors facing each other”.
Finally there is hard evidence, as explained on the Zembla web site,
that Nabokov and Gardner came to be aware of each other. Gardner wrote a
book (which I have to admit I have not yet read) called the Ambidextrous
Universe about mirror symmetries in nature (sounds like something from a
Nobokov novel to start with) which includes a quotation from the poet
John Shade without acknowledgement of fictional status and
subsequently Nabokov’s Ada or Ador cites this work referring to
the “invented philosopher (“Martin Gardner”)” .
To me the above seems quite convincing on a circumstantial basis but is
there hard evidence that Nabokov had in fact read the Annotated Alice
before writing Pale Fire and if so whether it influenced his thinking? I
would be really interested in this or views on plausibility.
Owen Crawley
[EDNOTE. The VN - MG connection is worth exploring further, although there were certainly more immediate and fundamental influences for VN's thinking about annotating works of literature, including his own commentary on Pushkin's Eugene Onegin. -- SES]
Search the archive: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/archives/nabokv-l.html
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