Subject
Fw: Comments on NY Times Review: Nabokov's Butterflies
From
Date
Body
----- Original Message -----
From: "Bouazza, Abdellah" <Abdellah.Bouazza@COMPAQ.COM>
> I agree with Mr Voss as far as the physical side of the book is concerned.
> However, I do not mind its heaviness nor its clinic uncomfortability -I do
> not read such books in bed. Indeed, the margins are generously wasteful,
> while the print size could have been eye-pleasingly larger. The poems
should
> have been printed spaciously, one poem per page, in order for the reader
to
> "relax" in those literary glades. I always detested endnotes especially
when
> they are as valuable as in this case.
> I don't think that this book should be read or is meant to be read from
> beginning to end: I like to see it as a kind of Nabokovian encyclopaedia.
> Please, Mr Voss, let us not revert to that misplaced philantropism that
> considers the "general reader" and the "common reader". I doubt whether
> there is such a thing with more than a evanescent interest in Lolita's
> notoriety.
> As to its price, believe me, $ 45 is not that exorbitant as compared to,
for
> example, "Nabokov and His Fiction: New Perspectives".
> To Mr Voss's cynical "Nabokov's chess next?", I would say: yes, please,
why
> not?
>
> A. Bouazza.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: D. Barton Johnson [mailto:chtodel@gte.net]
> Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2000 6:53 PM
> To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> Subject: Comments on NY Times Review: Nabokov's Butterflies
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <Mvoscol@aol.com>
> >
> > ----------------- Message requiring your approval (28
> lines) ------------------
> > Thus far I have seen only two reviews of Boyd/Pyle's "Nabokov's
> Butterflies",
> > one in the Daily Telegraph (London) and the one in the New York Times
> kindly
> > supplied by Kurt Johnson. These reviews have two things in common: they
> are
> > shortish and less than enthusiastic. And I think this should not come
as
> > much of a surprise. What is the general reader to make of the book?
> Pages
> > upon pages of quotations from VN's published works ripped from their
> > contexts, scientific writings that would be of no interest whatsoever to
> the
> > common reader had they been written by someone other than VN. Although
> one
> > might admire all the diligence and enthusiasm that went into the
> preparation
> > of VN's scientific papers and his meticulous drawings I doubt whether
this
> > will make "Nabokov's Butterflies" a runaway bestseller. How about the
> > "non-scientific" content? A good deal of that is composed of recycled
> > extracts from books I have on my shelves anyway. What remains is the
> > hitherto unpublished (non-scientific) material like the discarded second
> > addendum to "The Gift", some previously unpublished poems or poems not
> > reprinted after their first publications (unfortunately not with the
> original
> > Russian en regard), excerpts from letters etc. $45 is quite a price to
pay
> > for the privilege to have those. Moreover, the book is, in my opinion,
> not
> > really attractive physically. A heavy tome uncomfortable to read in
bed,
> > with wasteful margins, with photographs in the text not terribly well
> > reproduced, with notes that are endnotes when they should be footnotes
> etc.
> > Apparently the major publishing conglomerates fought shy of this
> compilation
> > (although the book has been bought in by Viking-Penguin's Bodley Head
> imprint
> > in the United Kingdom). (I had never heard of "Beacon Press" before.)
> No,
> > "Nabokov's Butterflies" is strictly for enthusiasts and completists.
> > "Nabobov's chess" next?
> >
> > Manfred Voss
From: "Bouazza, Abdellah" <Abdellah.Bouazza@COMPAQ.COM>
> I agree with Mr Voss as far as the physical side of the book is concerned.
> However, I do not mind its heaviness nor its clinic uncomfortability -I do
> not read such books in bed. Indeed, the margins are generously wasteful,
> while the print size could have been eye-pleasingly larger. The poems
should
> have been printed spaciously, one poem per page, in order for the reader
to
> "relax" in those literary glades. I always detested endnotes especially
when
> they are as valuable as in this case.
> I don't think that this book should be read or is meant to be read from
> beginning to end: I like to see it as a kind of Nabokovian encyclopaedia.
> Please, Mr Voss, let us not revert to that misplaced philantropism that
> considers the "general reader" and the "common reader". I doubt whether
> there is such a thing with more than a evanescent interest in Lolita's
> notoriety.
> As to its price, believe me, $ 45 is not that exorbitant as compared to,
for
> example, "Nabokov and His Fiction: New Perspectives".
> To Mr Voss's cynical "Nabokov's chess next?", I would say: yes, please,
why
> not?
>
> A. Bouazza.
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: D. Barton Johnson [mailto:chtodel@gte.net]
> Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2000 6:53 PM
> To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> Subject: Comments on NY Times Review: Nabokov's Butterflies
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <Mvoscol@aol.com>
> >
> > ----------------- Message requiring your approval (28
> lines) ------------------
> > Thus far I have seen only two reviews of Boyd/Pyle's "Nabokov's
> Butterflies",
> > one in the Daily Telegraph (London) and the one in the New York Times
> kindly
> > supplied by Kurt Johnson. These reviews have two things in common: they
> are
> > shortish and less than enthusiastic. And I think this should not come
as
> > much of a surprise. What is the general reader to make of the book?
> Pages
> > upon pages of quotations from VN's published works ripped from their
> > contexts, scientific writings that would be of no interest whatsoever to
> the
> > common reader had they been written by someone other than VN. Although
> one
> > might admire all the diligence and enthusiasm that went into the
> preparation
> > of VN's scientific papers and his meticulous drawings I doubt whether
this
> > will make "Nabokov's Butterflies" a runaway bestseller. How about the
> > "non-scientific" content? A good deal of that is composed of recycled
> > extracts from books I have on my shelves anyway. What remains is the
> > hitherto unpublished (non-scientific) material like the discarded second
> > addendum to "The Gift", some previously unpublished poems or poems not
> > reprinted after their first publications (unfortunately not with the
> original
> > Russian en regard), excerpts from letters etc. $45 is quite a price to
pay
> > for the privilege to have those. Moreover, the book is, in my opinion,
> not
> > really attractive physically. A heavy tome uncomfortable to read in
bed,
> > with wasteful margins, with photographs in the text not terribly well
> > reproduced, with notes that are endnotes when they should be footnotes
> etc.
> > Apparently the major publishing conglomerates fought shy of this
> compilation
> > (although the book has been bought in by Viking-Penguin's Bodley Head
> imprint
> > in the United Kingdom). (I had never heard of "Beacon Press" before.)
> No,
> > "Nabokov's Butterflies" is strictly for enthusiasts and completists.
> > "Nabobov's chess" next?
> >
> > Manfred Voss