Subject
Fw: Lepidopterist Nabokov carried tradition of gentleman ...
From
Date
Body
----- Original Message -----
From: "Brian Boyd (FOA ENG)" <b.boyd@auckland.ac.nz>
> This seems to me to reek of glib preconception and to ignore masses of
> evidence. Nabokov was happy to work with fellow-lepidopterists who were
> carpenters, businessmen or academically trained scientists, as long as
they
> knew their leps, and to criticize others who didn't, regardless of their
> background. And far from adhering to old principles of taxonomy, Nabokov
was
> considered a radical in the 1940s, and his work rediscovered with amazed
> gratitude by the top scientists in the Blues in the 1980s and 1990s.
>
> Brian Boyd
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: D. Barton Johnson
> To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> Sent: 8/13/2004 10:24 AM
> Subject: Lepidopterist Nabokov carried tradition of gentleman ...
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Sandy P. <mailto:spklein52@hotmail.com> Klein
> To: spklein52@hotmail.com <mailto:spklein52@hotmail.com>
> Sent: Wednesday, August 11, 2004 8:53 PM
> Subject: Nabokov carried tradition of gentleman ...
>
>
>
>
> NEWSLETTER
>
> _____
>
>
>
> The Center for the Humanities
>
> A MEMBER OF THE CONSORTIUM OF HUMANITIES CENTERS AND INSTITUTES
> AUTZEN HOUSE OREGON <http://osu.orst.edu/> STATE UNIVERSITY
> August 2004
> _____
>
>
>
> <http://oregonstate.edu/dept/humanities/newsletter/2000-spring/nabokov.h
> tml>
> http://oregonstate.edu/dept/humanities/newsletter/2000-spring/nabokov.ht
> ml
>
> Nabokov carried tradition of gentleman naturalist into mid-century
>
> Although writer Vladimir Nabokov often used a hand lens for his
> taxonomic study of butterflies, historian Daniel Alexandrov may be the
> first to treat Nabokov himself as a "lens," specifically to provide a
> view of fundamental changes in Western culture during the first half of
> the 1900s.
>
> "A Russian aristocrat, writer and scientist, Nabokov represents the
> features of a cultural world of 'aristocratic' natural history which
> blended aesthetics and science," said Alexandrov, a Center Research
> Fellow and historian of science from the European University of St.
> Petersburg. "Through the lens of Nabokov and entomology, I'm studying
> major changes in thought-style and lifestyle in the 20th century."
>
>
> Daniel Alexandrov
> <http://oregonstate.edu/dept/humanities/newsletter/2000-spring/images/da
> niel-alexandrov.jpg> The changes signaled the end of "genteel" cultural
> practices rooted in 19th century culture, a shift that Alexandrov said
> can be attributed to a number of factors, including World War I,
> industrialism, and a move away from classical education. An important
> aspect of the shift was the replacement of traditional taxonomy by
> modern science, a transformation that Nabokov resisted. That he refused
> to change his thinking in response to contemporary Darwinian views makes
> him a useful focal point for Alexandrov's analysis of changing cultural
> practices in Russia and the West.
>
>
> Nabokov's science, like his writing, is inseparably rooted in a
> privileged upbringing in a St. Petersburg house and country estate rich
> with paintings and insects, art and nature. Butterflies and beetles were
> for him, as for other aristocratic entomologists of the time, aesthetic
> objects akin to paintings and engravings. Nature was equated with art,
> and the conservation of nature with the preservation of art.
>
>
> When the Bolsehvik revolution forced the family to emigrate to Europe,
> the trappings of an aristocratic lifestyle were left behind although
> Nabokov's aristocratic point of view remained intact even when he moved
> to the United States in 1940. He taught at Wellesley and worked for six
> years as a curator of butterflies in the Museum of Comparative Zoology
> at Harvard. Already a published novelist in Russian, Nabokov's first
> publication in English was the article, "A Few Notes on Crimean
> Lepidoptera."
>
>
> Vladimir Nabokov
> <http://oregonstate.edu/dept/humanities/newsletter/2000-spring/images/vl
> adimir-nabokov.jpg> His vision of nature and belief in the immanent
> laws of form put Nabokov at the center of a debate in taxonomy and
> evolutionary biology fueled by Darwinian ideas, including Ernst Mayr's
> population concept of species, that is as an interbreeding population
> rather than a set of individuals sharing observable "type"
> characteristics. A sharp critic of Mayr, Nabokov wrote, "Taxonomists
> would be far better in describing with precision all the morphological
> details of certain forms than in studying so-called populations - what a
> dreadfully misused and hideous word, anyway."
>
>
> In his autobiographical Speak, Memory, Nabokov marvels at the elaborate
> mimicry in larvae and butterflies aimed at fooling predators, and
> dismisses Darwin's evolutionary explanation: "'Natural selection,' in
> the Darwinian sense, could not explain the miraculous coincidence of
> imitative aspect and imitative behavior, nor could one appeal to the
> theory of 'the struggle for life' when a protective devise was carried
> to a point of mimetic subtlety, exuberance, and luxury far in excess of
> a predator's power of appreciation. Both were a form of magic, both were
> a game of intricate enchantment and deception."
>
>
> The new taxonomic approach attempted to eliminate aesthetics from
> science, said Alexandrov, by its recognition of the boundaries between
> the scientific and non-scientific, between science and art. Some
> characterize the discarding of aesthetic principles for purposes of
> biological classification as a "professionalization" of science but this
> is too narrow a view - Nabokov and others like him were certainly
> "professional" in their meticulousness. What changed was the notion of
> expertise. When the aristocracy dominated public and professional life,
> fields such as entomology, law and medicine were assumed to require a
> "gift" for the work. Entomology, like painting, required a "special
> eye." In the new industrial society, the keys to becoming an expert were
> training and education.
>
>
> Science, in particular, was assumed to be accessible to anyone who could
> learn the skills, and this, in turn, was linked to the education system.
> As part of the move toward efficiency in schools after the war,
> high-brow genteel education was replaced by modernist education, with a
> strong attack on gentlemanly, "useless" Latin and Greek. Although
> Nabokov was sent to a school in St. Petersburg that down-played Greek
> and Latin, his upbringing formed him into a representative of high
> culture that, unlike many peers, he never relinquished.
>
>
> "Many who had been raised with aristocratic lifestyles 'surrendered' in
> the 1930's, that is, they changed their minds, not just because of
> arguments against the past but because their daily lives changed -
> thought-style changes with lifestyle. But Nabokov lived in his past and
> his prose. There was no need for him to change his life and mode of
> thought."
>
>
> Had he remained in Russia, it's possible, perhaps likely, that Nabokov
> would have become an entomologist who wrote rather than a writer who did
> entomology. Recognizing that both pursuits were of consuming seriousness
> - and prodded by his wife, Vera - Nabokov focused on writing, and was
> not employed as an entomologist again after the Harvard stint although
> he collected and studied butterflies until his death in 1977.
>
>
> Although Alexandrov will include several other expatriot Russian
> entomologists in his study, Nabokov is the key figure. His loyalty to
> aesthetic essentialism into the middle of the 20thcentury, said
> Alexandrov, "allows us to view both the cultural richness of a form of
> life to which he belonged and the ending of its existence brought about
> by general changes in the modernization and professionalization of
> science."
>
>
>
>
>
From: "Brian Boyd (FOA ENG)" <b.boyd@auckland.ac.nz>
> This seems to me to reek of glib preconception and to ignore masses of
> evidence. Nabokov was happy to work with fellow-lepidopterists who were
> carpenters, businessmen or academically trained scientists, as long as
they
> knew their leps, and to criticize others who didn't, regardless of their
> background. And far from adhering to old principles of taxonomy, Nabokov
was
> considered a radical in the 1940s, and his work rediscovered with amazed
> gratitude by the top scientists in the Blues in the 1980s and 1990s.
>
> Brian Boyd
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: D. Barton Johnson
> To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> Sent: 8/13/2004 10:24 AM
> Subject: Lepidopterist Nabokov carried tradition of gentleman ...
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Sandy P. <mailto:spklein52@hotmail.com> Klein
> To: spklein52@hotmail.com <mailto:spklein52@hotmail.com>
> Sent: Wednesday, August 11, 2004 8:53 PM
> Subject: Nabokov carried tradition of gentleman ...
>
>
>
>
> NEWSLETTER
>
> _____
>
>
>
> The Center for the Humanities
>
> A MEMBER OF THE CONSORTIUM OF HUMANITIES CENTERS AND INSTITUTES
> AUTZEN HOUSE OREGON <http://osu.orst.edu/> STATE UNIVERSITY
> August 2004
> _____
>
>
>
> <http://oregonstate.edu/dept/humanities/newsletter/2000-spring/nabokov.h
> tml>
> http://oregonstate.edu/dept/humanities/newsletter/2000-spring/nabokov.ht
> ml
>
> Nabokov carried tradition of gentleman naturalist into mid-century
>
> Although writer Vladimir Nabokov often used a hand lens for his
> taxonomic study of butterflies, historian Daniel Alexandrov may be the
> first to treat Nabokov himself as a "lens," specifically to provide a
> view of fundamental changes in Western culture during the first half of
> the 1900s.
>
> "A Russian aristocrat, writer and scientist, Nabokov represents the
> features of a cultural world of 'aristocratic' natural history which
> blended aesthetics and science," said Alexandrov, a Center Research
> Fellow and historian of science from the European University of St.
> Petersburg. "Through the lens of Nabokov and entomology, I'm studying
> major changes in thought-style and lifestyle in the 20th century."
>
>
> Daniel Alexandrov
> <http://oregonstate.edu/dept/humanities/newsletter/2000-spring/images/da
> niel-alexandrov.jpg> The changes signaled the end of "genteel" cultural
> practices rooted in 19th century culture, a shift that Alexandrov said
> can be attributed to a number of factors, including World War I,
> industrialism, and a move away from classical education. An important
> aspect of the shift was the replacement of traditional taxonomy by
> modern science, a transformation that Nabokov resisted. That he refused
> to change his thinking in response to contemporary Darwinian views makes
> him a useful focal point for Alexandrov's analysis of changing cultural
> practices in Russia and the West.
>
>
> Nabokov's science, like his writing, is inseparably rooted in a
> privileged upbringing in a St. Petersburg house and country estate rich
> with paintings and insects, art and nature. Butterflies and beetles were
> for him, as for other aristocratic entomologists of the time, aesthetic
> objects akin to paintings and engravings. Nature was equated with art,
> and the conservation of nature with the preservation of art.
>
>
> When the Bolsehvik revolution forced the family to emigrate to Europe,
> the trappings of an aristocratic lifestyle were left behind although
> Nabokov's aristocratic point of view remained intact even when he moved
> to the United States in 1940. He taught at Wellesley and worked for six
> years as a curator of butterflies in the Museum of Comparative Zoology
> at Harvard. Already a published novelist in Russian, Nabokov's first
> publication in English was the article, "A Few Notes on Crimean
> Lepidoptera."
>
>
> Vladimir Nabokov
> <http://oregonstate.edu/dept/humanities/newsletter/2000-spring/images/vl
> adimir-nabokov.jpg> His vision of nature and belief in the immanent
> laws of form put Nabokov at the center of a debate in taxonomy and
> evolutionary biology fueled by Darwinian ideas, including Ernst Mayr's
> population concept of species, that is as an interbreeding population
> rather than a set of individuals sharing observable "type"
> characteristics. A sharp critic of Mayr, Nabokov wrote, "Taxonomists
> would be far better in describing with precision all the morphological
> details of certain forms than in studying so-called populations - what a
> dreadfully misused and hideous word, anyway."
>
>
> In his autobiographical Speak, Memory, Nabokov marvels at the elaborate
> mimicry in larvae and butterflies aimed at fooling predators, and
> dismisses Darwin's evolutionary explanation: "'Natural selection,' in
> the Darwinian sense, could not explain the miraculous coincidence of
> imitative aspect and imitative behavior, nor could one appeal to the
> theory of 'the struggle for life' when a protective devise was carried
> to a point of mimetic subtlety, exuberance, and luxury far in excess of
> a predator's power of appreciation. Both were a form of magic, both were
> a game of intricate enchantment and deception."
>
>
> The new taxonomic approach attempted to eliminate aesthetics from
> science, said Alexandrov, by its recognition of the boundaries between
> the scientific and non-scientific, between science and art. Some
> characterize the discarding of aesthetic principles for purposes of
> biological classification as a "professionalization" of science but this
> is too narrow a view - Nabokov and others like him were certainly
> "professional" in their meticulousness. What changed was the notion of
> expertise. When the aristocracy dominated public and professional life,
> fields such as entomology, law and medicine were assumed to require a
> "gift" for the work. Entomology, like painting, required a "special
> eye." In the new industrial society, the keys to becoming an expert were
> training and education.
>
>
> Science, in particular, was assumed to be accessible to anyone who could
> learn the skills, and this, in turn, was linked to the education system.
> As part of the move toward efficiency in schools after the war,
> high-brow genteel education was replaced by modernist education, with a
> strong attack on gentlemanly, "useless" Latin and Greek. Although
> Nabokov was sent to a school in St. Petersburg that down-played Greek
> and Latin, his upbringing formed him into a representative of high
> culture that, unlike many peers, he never relinquished.
>
>
> "Many who had been raised with aristocratic lifestyles 'surrendered' in
> the 1930's, that is, they changed their minds, not just because of
> arguments against the past but because their daily lives changed -
> thought-style changes with lifestyle. But Nabokov lived in his past and
> his prose. There was no need for him to change his life and mode of
> thought."
>
>
> Had he remained in Russia, it's possible, perhaps likely, that Nabokov
> would have become an entomologist who wrote rather than a writer who did
> entomology. Recognizing that both pursuits were of consuming seriousness
> - and prodded by his wife, Vera - Nabokov focused on writing, and was
> not employed as an entomologist again after the Harvard stint although
> he collected and studied butterflies until his death in 1977.
>
>
> Although Alexandrov will include several other expatriot Russian
> entomologists in his study, Nabokov is the key figure. His loyalty to
> aesthetic essentialism into the middle of the 20thcentury, said
> Alexandrov, "allows us to view both the cultural richness of a form of
> life to which he belonged and the ending of its existence brought about
> by general changes in the modernization and professionalization of
> science."
>
>
>
>
>