Subject
Re: TT-12 Introductory Notes (fwd)
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After a query from me, Don has kindly urged me to pick up where
I had left off, as a result of a dying computer, now replaced.
It had essentially kept me "off the air" for about a month.
I am reminded of Kin Hubbard's saying, via Abe Martin, "Mrs
Leafy Branch was confined to her home over the week-end due
to a stuck bureau drawer."
I'll follow the general format of attaching my suggestions to
Introductory Notes, but will take the liberty of snipping
those Notes I'm not commenting on to save space, and avoid
having people puzzle out where my remarks are.
John
D. Barton Johnson wrote:
> ---------- Forwarded Message ----------
> Date: Saturday, August 14, 2004 9:02 AM +0900
> From: Akiko Nakata <a-nakata@courante.plala.or.jp>
> To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> Subject: TT-12 Introductory Notes
37.12 ...This might be an echo from the old dog waiting for Ulysses
to return.""
It also echoes that same motif in the "Tristan Fou" episode
Tristan and Isolde, where the dog recognizes the disguised
tTristan before Isolde does. One of many such echoes in
Nabokov.
> 37.17-19: The cries of children at play came from behind the wall and a
> shuttleclock sailed over it to land at his feet.
This echoes Humberts' statement in Lolita, 310, "What I heard was the
melody of children at play."
> 38.14-15: Charles Chamar, nee Anastasia Petrovna Potapov: A pair of
> alliterative names. Anastasia is, for the "average reader," the name of a
> Romanov princess, Grand Duchess Anastasia, who was once believed to have
> survived assassination. The name sounds like "in a very noble milieu" (Ch.
> 9).
Anastasia also "contains" anagramatically the Nastia, of Villa
Nastia.
38.18 Kharbin is a variant spelling of the more English Harbin in
Manchuria.
> 38.29-30: impossible chestnut suit: Cf. "you know, Timofey, this brown suit
> of yours is a mistake: a gentleman does not wear brown" (*Pnin* I. 6).
Based on the British assertion that, "a Gentleman doesn't wear brown
in the city," wherein "city" refers to the "financial district' of
London, and brown was what a gentleman might wear afield at his country
estate for hunting, etc.
>
> 40.04: "Everything is well": Cf. "with its sense of 'all-is-well'" (Ch.
> 15).
This phraseology, "Everything is well" is unnatural in English.
> 42.11-14: "tell her that my system is poisoned by her, by her twenty
> sisters, her twenty dwindlings in backcast,
"dwindlings" reflects an early English "twinlings" diminutive for
"twins", (much like German "Zwilling") with the first syllable
"regressed" to its Indo-European root form "dui"
> 43.06-07: a blindman's cup/cap: Which is correct?
either! Some beggars hold out a cup for their asked for alms, others
their cap.
>
> 43.11: She invited "Percy":
I'll comment on this in the next chapter
>
> 43.13: > "but shade I must have," "the flame of his interest" (Ch. 12)
And of course John Shade of Pale Fire: Nabokov liked to occasionally
plug his own works!
That's all for now, and thanks for your patience. I'll try to post
for a chapter every day or two until I'm caught up, if you'll
permit me.
John
.
>
> Akiko Nakata
>
> ---------- End Forwarded Message ----------
>
----- End forwarded message -----
I had left off, as a result of a dying computer, now replaced.
It had essentially kept me "off the air" for about a month.
I am reminded of Kin Hubbard's saying, via Abe Martin, "Mrs
Leafy Branch was confined to her home over the week-end due
to a stuck bureau drawer."
I'll follow the general format of attaching my suggestions to
Introductory Notes, but will take the liberty of snipping
those Notes I'm not commenting on to save space, and avoid
having people puzzle out where my remarks are.
John
D. Barton Johnson wrote:
> ---------- Forwarded Message ----------
> Date: Saturday, August 14, 2004 9:02 AM +0900
> From: Akiko Nakata <a-nakata@courante.plala.or.jp>
> To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> Subject: TT-12 Introductory Notes
37.12 ...This might be an echo from the old dog waiting for Ulysses
to return.""
It also echoes that same motif in the "Tristan Fou" episode
Tristan and Isolde, where the dog recognizes the disguised
tTristan before Isolde does. One of many such echoes in
Nabokov.
> 37.17-19: The cries of children at play came from behind the wall and a
> shuttleclock sailed over it to land at his feet.
This echoes Humberts' statement in Lolita, 310, "What I heard was the
melody of children at play."
> 38.14-15: Charles Chamar, nee Anastasia Petrovna Potapov: A pair of
> alliterative names. Anastasia is, for the "average reader," the name of a
> Romanov princess, Grand Duchess Anastasia, who was once believed to have
> survived assassination. The name sounds like "in a very noble milieu" (Ch.
> 9).
Anastasia also "contains" anagramatically the Nastia, of Villa
Nastia.
38.18 Kharbin is a variant spelling of the more English Harbin in
Manchuria.
> 38.29-30: impossible chestnut suit: Cf. "you know, Timofey, this brown suit
> of yours is a mistake: a gentleman does not wear brown" (*Pnin* I. 6).
Based on the British assertion that, "a Gentleman doesn't wear brown
in the city," wherein "city" refers to the "financial district' of
London, and brown was what a gentleman might wear afield at his country
estate for hunting, etc.
>
> 40.04: "Everything is well": Cf. "with its sense of 'all-is-well'" (Ch.
> 15).
This phraseology, "Everything is well" is unnatural in English.
> 42.11-14: "tell her that my system is poisoned by her, by her twenty
> sisters, her twenty dwindlings in backcast,
"dwindlings" reflects an early English "twinlings" diminutive for
"twins", (much like German "Zwilling") with the first syllable
"regressed" to its Indo-European root form "dui"
> 43.06-07: a blindman's cup/cap: Which is correct?
either! Some beggars hold out a cup for their asked for alms, others
their cap.
>
> 43.11: She invited "Percy":
I'll comment on this in the next chapter
>
> 43.13: > "but shade I must have," "the flame of his interest" (Ch. 12)
And of course John Shade of Pale Fire: Nabokov liked to occasionally
plug his own works!
That's all for now, and thanks for your patience. I'll try to post
for a chapter every day or two until I'm caught up, if you'll
permit me.
John
.
>
> Akiko Nakata
>
> ---------- End Forwarded Message ----------
>
----- End forwarded message -----