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Re: On symmetry and Kinbote
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> I don't see K. and S. getting confused in the Index entry on Shade. A lot of
the pronouns do indeed refer to Kinbote, but they always have an antecedent
in an earlier K. I took that as more of his egoism.
>
> Yes, it's interesting that the letter C can sound like both K and S (and it
looks like, and is etymologically related to, G). But at that level you can
konnekt everything with everything elce.
Dear Jerry,
Since this is the only novel I know that has an index even of any sort, I
can't say that you are wrong, but in usual indexes the "he" refers to the
person named in the heading. But under "Shade" in this index Shade is
sometime "S" and sometimes "he"'; Kinbote is sometimes
"K" and sometimes "he." The entries under "Kinbote" don't make this
confusion.
I do wish someone would analyze that Index - - it is quite interesting. For
example this is found on the title page: "The capital letters stand for the
three main characters G, K. S (which see) in this work."
That "(which see)" is interesting because there are no such headings in the
index, whereas the rest of the "qv"s always do take you to other headings,
if not always helpfully. So I think "see" might be a pun on "C" just as
"capital letters" is a pun on "characters." My attention was drawn to this
as a clue because of the odd combination of simplicity and deceit in this
apparently innocent statement. I was also struck at the oddity of the
ordering of the three "characters" (why not K, S, G or S, K, G?).
I concluded that VN wished to draw the reader's attention to those
characters/letters - - but of course I could be wrong as you suggest.
(In your theory, is it egoism if someone fulsomely admires his other
personality? Maybe Kinbote suffers from alteregoism.)
Alteregoism? Wonderful! (why didn't I think of that?)
Carolyn
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