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Fwd: Re: Re: TT: Odoevsky, Dostoevsky, Swedenborg
From
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----- Forwarded message from a-nakata@courante.plala.or.jp -----
Date: Fri, 26 Nov 2004 09:25:49 +0900
From: Akiko Nakata <a-nakata@courante.plala.or.jp>
Dear Alexey and all,
Alexey, thank you very much for your clarification on "Russian Nights."
Odoevsky must be one of the Russian writers who form the composite.
As for Dostoevsky, neither can I say what he is doing in TT (except that we
could trace the origin of Mr. R as a pedophile, via HH, as far as
Dostoevsky) but I do not think VN calls the writer "a minor Dostoevsky" just
drawing a red herring either.
I am sorry I was wrong when I wrote "Dostoevsky wrote in *A Writer's Diary*
that he took Swedenborg's psychic powers of clairvoyance seriously."
Probably he wrote that in a draft of *A Writer's Diary* but did not publish
it. Also in his letters, he often writes about his great anxiety for his
children, which assails him as a vision like clairvoyance. Did VN know that?
Or does Dostoevsky write about clairvoyance or translucency in his works? I
only remember some characters talk about such an unearthly vision they have
just before an epileptic fit (Fit?).
Best wishes,
Akiko
----- Original Message -----
From: Donald B. Johnson
To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
Sent: Thursday, November 25, 2004 6:09 AM
Subject: Re: TT: Odoevsky, Dostoevsky, Swedenborg
----- Forwarded message from sklyarenko@users.mns.ru -----
Date: Wed, 24 Nov 2004 22:58:45 +0300
From: alex <sklyarenko@users.mns.ru>
Dear Akiko and all,
Unfortunately, I haven't read Odoevsky's "Russian Nights" and cannot tell
you
much about that novel. I skimmed through the first chapter (First Night)
though
(the full text of the novel can be seen, in Russian, at
http://orel.rsl.ru/nettext/russian/odoevsky/noshi.htm) and I find that at
least
some of the motifs in TT can indeed go back to Odoevsky's novel.
For example, in the first chapter there is a detailed description of a
coach
followed by a meditation on the long way mankind had to make in order to
produce such an ordinary thing as a coach.
One of the novel's characters is nicknamed Faust.
From what I have read I couldn't determine where the novel is set. It must
be
either Moscow, or Petersburg. Probably it is Moscow where Odoevsky was
born and
where he lived before moving to Petersburg in 1846. Finally, I learned
from a
biographic article that Odoevsky was a mystic and that at the time he
wrote RN
he experienced the strong influence of the European mystics (St. Martin,
Arndt,
Portridge, Baader et al.).
All this seems to confirm Simon Karlinsky's suggestion that "the Russian
novelist" in the chapter 6 of TT is a composite figure and that Odoevsky
can be
regarded as one of the possible prototypes.
Still, I think that the parallels between TT and Turgenev's "Faust" are
even
more striking. "Faust" begins with the hero revisiting his "old nest"
after
nine years of absence and ends with the heroine's late mother (whom the
hero
had known when she was alive) snatching her daughter away from the hero at
the
moment when she is on the point of becoming his lover.
As for Dostoevsky, I doubt that he plays any serious role in TT (he is
very
important in ADA, though).
best,
Alexey
----- Original Message -----
From: Donald B. Johnson
To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
Sent: Saturday, November 20, 2004 7:47 PM
Subject: Fwd: TT: Odoevsky, Dostoevsky, Swedenborg
----- Forwarded message from a-nakata@courante.plala.or.jp -----
Date: Sat, 20 Nov 2004 16:42:44 +0900
From: Akiko Nakata <a-nakata@courante.plala.or.jp>
Thanks to Jansy and Alexey, the thread connecting Pauline and Turgenev
is
getting thicker.
As Don has mentioned before, Simon Karlinsky suggests that we should not
expect the Russian novelist in Ch. 6 to be a writer we know but consider
him
an amalgam (like Koncheyev in *The Gift*) of several nineteenth-century
Russian writers such as Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Gogol, Vladimir Odoevsky.
All
of them have similarities to and differences from the novelist in
question.
According to Karlinsky, *Faust in Moscow* would be a highly appropriate
title for Odoevsky's *Russian Nights*. I would be grateful if Alexey or
anyone would kindly tell me more about the novel. Are there parallelisms
between the novel and TT?
Russian Nights (1844)
Vladimir Fedorovich Odoevsky (1804-1869)
This captivating novel is the summation of Odoevsky's views and
interests in
many fields: Gothic literature, romanticism, mysticism, the occult,
social
responsibility, Westernization, utopia and anti-utopia. Compared to The
Decameron, to Hoffman's Serapion Brethren, and to the Platonic
dialogues,
Russian Nights is a unique mixture of romantic and society tales framed
by
Odoevsky's musings on strands of Russian thought and his own obsessions.
A thing about Dostoevsky. Recently I happened to read that Dostoevsky
wrote
in *A Writer's Diary* that he took Swedenborg's psychic powers of
clairvoyance seriously. Does he write about clairvoyance or translucency
in
his works?
Akiko
----- End forwarded message -----
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
Thanks to Jansy and Alexey, the thread connecting Pauline and Turgenev
is
getting thicker.
As Don has mentioned before, Simon Karlinsky suggests that we should not
expect the Russian novelist in Ch. 6 to be a writer we know but consider
him an
amalgam (like Koncheyev in *The Gift*) of several nineteenth-century
Russian
writers such as Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Gogol, Vladimir Odoevsky. All of
them
have similarities to and differences from the novelist in question.
According
to Karlinsky, *Faust in Moscow* would be a highly appropriate title for
Odoevsky's *Russian Nights*. I would be grateful if Alexey or anyone would
kindly tell me more about the novel. Are there parallelisms between the
novel
and TT?
Russian Nights (1844)
Vladimir Fedorovich Odoevsky (1804-1869)
This captivating novel is the summation of Odoevsky's views and
interests in
many fields: Gothic literature, romanticism, mysticism, the occult, social
responsibility, Westernization, utopia and anti-utopia. Compared to The
Decameron, to Hoffman's Serapion Brethren, and to the Platonic dialogues,
Russian Nights is a unique mixture of romantic and society tales framed by
Odoevsky's musings on strands of Russian thought and his own obsessions.
A thing about Dostoevsky. Recently I happened to read that Dostoevsky
wrote in
*A Writer's Diary* that he took Swedenborg's psychic powers of
clairvoyance
seriously. Does he write about clairvoyance or translucency in his works?
Akiko
----- End forwarded message -----
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
--
Dear Akiko and all,
Unfortunately, I haven't read Odoevsky's "Russian Nights" and cannot tell
you much about that novel. I skimmed through the first chapter (First Night)
though (the full text of the novel can be seen, in Russian, at
http://orel.rsl.ru/nettext/russian/odoevsky/noshi.htm) and I find that at
least some of the motifs in TT can indeed go back to Odoevsky's novel.
For example, in the first chapter there is a detailed description of a
coach followed by a meditation on the long way mankind had to make in order
to produce such an ordinary thing as a coach.
One of the novel's characters is nicknamed Faust.
From what I have read I couldn't determine where the novel is set. It must
be either Moscow, or Petersburg. Probably it is Moscow where Odoevsky was
born and where he lived before moving to Petersburg in 1846. Finally, I
learned from a biographic article that Odoevsky was a mystic and that at the
time he wrote RN he experienced the strong influence of the European mystics
(St. Martin, Arndt, Portridge, Baader et al.).
All this seems to confirm Simon Karlinsky's suggestion that "the Russian
novelist" in the chapter 6 of TT is a composite figure and that Odoevsky can
be regarded as one of the possible prototypes.
Still, I think that the parallels between TT and Turgenev's "Faust" are
even more striking. "Faust" begins with the hero revisiting his "old nest"
after nine years of absence and ends with the heroine's late mother (whom
the hero had known when she was alive) snatching her daughter away from the
hero at the moment when she is on the point of becoming his lover.
As for Dostoevsky, I doubt that he plays any serious role in TT (he is
very important in ADA, though).
best,
Alexey
----- Original Message -----
From: Donald B. Johnson
To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
Sent: Saturday, November 20, 2004 7:47 PM
Subject: Fwd: TT: Odoevsky, Dostoevsky, Swedenborg
----- Forwarded message from a-nakata@courante.plala.or.jp -----
Date: Sat, 20 Nov 2004 16:42:44 +0900
From: Akiko Nakata <a-nakata@courante.plala.or.jp>
Thanks to Jansy and Alexey, the thread connecting Pauline and Turgenev
is
getting thicker.
As Don has mentioned before, Simon Karlinsky suggests that we should not
expect the Russian novelist in Ch. 6 to be a writer we know but consider
him
an amalgam (like Koncheyev in *The Gift*) of several nineteenth-century
Russian writers such as Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Gogol, Vladimir Odoevsky.
All
of them have similarities to and differences from the novelist in
question.
According to Karlinsky, *Faust in Moscow* would be a highly appropriate
title for Odoevsky's *Russian Nights*. I would be grateful if Alexey or
anyone would kindly tell me more about the novel. Are there parallelisms
between the novel and TT?
Russian Nights (1844)
Vladimir Fedorovich Odoevsky (1804-1869)
This captivating novel is the summation of Odoevsky's views and
interests in
many fields: Gothic literature, romanticism, mysticism, the occult,
social
responsibility, Westernization, utopia and anti-utopia. Compared to The
Decameron, to Hoffman's Serapion Brethren, and to the Platonic
dialogues,
Russian Nights is a unique mixture of romantic and society tales framed
by
Odoevsky's musings on strands of Russian thought and his own obsessions.
A thing about Dostoevsky. Recently I happened to read that Dostoevsky
wrote
in *A Writer's Diary* that he took Swedenborg's psychic powers of
clairvoyance seriously. Does he write about clairvoyance or translucency
in
his works?
Akiko
----- End forwarded message -----
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks to Jansy and Alexey, the thread connecting Pauline and Turgenev
is getting thicker.
As Don has mentioned before, Simon Karlinsky suggests that we should not
expect the Russian novelist in Ch. 6 to be a writer we know but consider him
an amalgam (like Koncheyev in *The Gift*) of several nineteenth-century
Russian writers such as Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Gogol, Vladimir Odoevsky. All
of them have similarities to and differences from the novelist in question.
According to Karlinsky, *Faust in Moscow* would be a highly appropriate
title for Odoevsky's *Russian Nights*. I would be grateful if Alexey or
anyone would kindly tell me more about the novel. Are there parallelisms
between the novel and TT?
Russian Nights (1844)
Vladimir Fedorovich Odoevsky (1804-1869)
This captivating novel is the summation of Odoevsky's views and
interests in many fields: Gothic literature, romanticism, mysticism, the
occult, social responsibility, Westernization, utopia and anti-utopia.
Compared to The Decameron, to Hoffman's Serapion Brethren, and to the
Platonic dialogues, Russian Nights is a unique mixture of romantic and
society tales framed by Odoevsky's musings on strands of Russian thought and
his own obsessions.
A thing about Dostoevsky. Recently I happened to read that Dostoevsky
wrote in *A Writer's Diary* that he took Swedenborg's psychic powers of
clairvoyance seriously. Does he write about clairvoyance or translucency in
his works?
Akiko
----- End forwarded message -----