Subject
Nabokov Centennial Events in Saint Petersburg
Date
Body
EDITOR's NOTE. NABOKV-L passes on a portion of an NYT's article dealing,
inter alia, with VN.
--------------------------------------
01/20/1999
The New York Times
Page 2, Column 3
c. 1999 New York Times Company
Herbert Mitgang. ST. PETERSBURG, Russia
The newest literary museum honors a naturalized American, Vladimir
Vladimirovich Nabokov, and is situated in the very building at Bolshaya
Morskaya, 47, near St. Isaac's Cathedral in the fashionable
Admiralteiskaya neighborhood, where he was born 100 years ago this
April. The building survived the German siege of Leningrad in World War
II.
Nabokov himself described its appearance in ''Speak, Memory,'' his
1967 memoir: ''We have moved now to our town house, a stylish Italianate
construction of pink Finnish granite built by my grandfather circa 1885,
with floral frescoes above the third (upper) story and a second-floor
oriel, in St. Petersburg (now Leningrad), 47 Morskaya (now Hertzen
Street). The children occupied the third floor.''
Because Aleksandr Sergeyevich Pushkin was born 200 years ago next
June, joint literary celebrations for the authors are being planned in
the spring and summer. Scholars will gather in Pushkin's more spacious
museum, at 12 Moyka Embankment, and visitors will be able to see the
refurbished Nabokov birthplace and one of his family's former estates
outside St. Petersburg.
It makes literary sense to commemorate them together. Nabokov
translated ''Eugene Onegin,'' the verse-novel that is Pushkin's
masterpiece. After Pushkin's ''Ode to Liberty'' and some of his
satirical verses offended the czarist court, he was exiled to southern
Russia. Nabokov went into self-imposed exile, emigrating in 1940 to the
United States, where he taught Russian and English literature at
Wellesley and Cornell. ''My course is a kind of detective investigation
of the mystery of literary structures,'' he said. Because of his work as
a lepidopterist, he was also affiliated with Harvard as a research
scientist. After the success of ''Lolita,'' ''Pnin'' and other writings,
he and his wife, Vera, made their home in the Montreux-Palace et Cygne,
a grande dame of a hotel overlooking Lake Geneva in Montreux,
Switzerland. Nabokov rather enjoyed the nickname conferred on him in his
cygnelike setting, ''The black swan of Montreux.'' They lived there for
18 years, until his death in 1977 at the age of 78.
Nabokov's writings were banned in the Soviet Union at the time, but
his books were smuggled into the country. Now they are published in St.
Petersburg and Moscow; both film versions of ''Lolita'' have been shown
on Russian screens.
The V. V. Nabokov Museum opened last spring as a private enterprise
after a determined effort by a small group of Nabokov admirers. Its
space included only the Nabokov family's foyer, library, dining area and
a large meeting room. The upper two floors are occupied by Nevsky Times,
an independent daily paper of cultural and educational news.
''Getting the museum off the ground was very difficult,'' said Dr.
Vadim Potrovich Stark, its director. ''The St. Petersburg administration
said it had no funds, but if we could raise the money ourselves we had
their permission to go ahead. We slowly gained sponsors from Russian and
foreign sources. We're now planning an international conference in
April, putting together an educational program for students and visitors
and trying to make a film about the museum.''
A seedy luxury is visible in the carved wooden ceilings, fireplaces,
piano and period furniture, some of which resembles the century-old
originals. In the largest room there is a long table with dozens of
high-backed chairs, once used for meetings conducted by Nabokov's
father, who was a leader of the independent Constitutional Democratic
Party before World War I. Nabokov had boxing and fencing lessons in that
room.
A permanent exhibition illustrates Nabokov's life in Russia, England,
Germany, France, the United States and Switzerland. Dangling from the
ceiling is a rather primitive painting of the Nabokov family's coat of
arms, two fierce lions and a raised arm holding a sword aloft. A second
painting shows a forlorn but accurately detailed butterfly drawn by
Nabokov himself. There are photographs of the Nabokov family and their
three former country houses. The photographs were donated by Nabokov's
son, Dmitri, and Nabokov's sister, Elena.
Three groups support the museum: the Nabokov Foundation in St.
Petersburg; DORN, a small publishing house that issues Nabokov's books
as well as those of Pushkin and other Russians, and a privately owned
Internet provider called Computer Net that works with museums. There
are a couple of Russian movie posters under a glass case showing Jeremy
Irons as Humbert Humbert in the recent film version of ''Lolita.'' While
he was in Russia for the opening of the movie last year, Dmitri Nabokov
visited his grandfather's mansion and admired the work being to
establish the museum.
During a recent telephone conversation with Dmitri Nabokov at his
home in Montreux, he commented on the two movie versions of ''Lolita.''
''The old Stanley Kubrick film was not bad, but my father felt that it
had nothing to do with his novel,'' he said. ''The current film by
Adrian Lyne is more faithful to the book.''
Through his own Nabokov Literary Foundation, Dmitri Nabokov has been
coordinating a number of events honoring his father in Russia, Europe
and the United States. There is to be a traveling exhibition in Europe,
a colloquium of scholars in St. Petersburg, discussions at Town Hall in
New York and an exhibition in the Berg Collection at the New York Public
Library in Manhattan.
Where will he be at birthday time?
''I'll be celebrating my father's two birthdays in two different
places,'' he said. Two?
''Yes,'' he replied. ''I'll be in St. Petersburg on April 10; that's
his birthday on the old calendar. And I'll be back in Montreux on April
22, where the town is planning big doings in his honor. Actually, my
father considered April 23d his real birthday, abiding by the new
calendar. Wherever, 1999 is going to be a Nabokov year.''
inter alia, with VN.
--------------------------------------
01/20/1999
The New York Times
Page 2, Column 3
c. 1999 New York Times Company
Herbert Mitgang. ST. PETERSBURG, Russia
The newest literary museum honors a naturalized American, Vladimir
Vladimirovich Nabokov, and is situated in the very building at Bolshaya
Morskaya, 47, near St. Isaac's Cathedral in the fashionable
Admiralteiskaya neighborhood, where he was born 100 years ago this
April. The building survived the German siege of Leningrad in World War
II.
Nabokov himself described its appearance in ''Speak, Memory,'' his
1967 memoir: ''We have moved now to our town house, a stylish Italianate
construction of pink Finnish granite built by my grandfather circa 1885,
with floral frescoes above the third (upper) story and a second-floor
oriel, in St. Petersburg (now Leningrad), 47 Morskaya (now Hertzen
Street). The children occupied the third floor.''
Because Aleksandr Sergeyevich Pushkin was born 200 years ago next
June, joint literary celebrations for the authors are being planned in
the spring and summer. Scholars will gather in Pushkin's more spacious
museum, at 12 Moyka Embankment, and visitors will be able to see the
refurbished Nabokov birthplace and one of his family's former estates
outside St. Petersburg.
It makes literary sense to commemorate them together. Nabokov
translated ''Eugene Onegin,'' the verse-novel that is Pushkin's
masterpiece. After Pushkin's ''Ode to Liberty'' and some of his
satirical verses offended the czarist court, he was exiled to southern
Russia. Nabokov went into self-imposed exile, emigrating in 1940 to the
United States, where he taught Russian and English literature at
Wellesley and Cornell. ''My course is a kind of detective investigation
of the mystery of literary structures,'' he said. Because of his work as
a lepidopterist, he was also affiliated with Harvard as a research
scientist. After the success of ''Lolita,'' ''Pnin'' and other writings,
he and his wife, Vera, made their home in the Montreux-Palace et Cygne,
a grande dame of a hotel overlooking Lake Geneva in Montreux,
Switzerland. Nabokov rather enjoyed the nickname conferred on him in his
cygnelike setting, ''The black swan of Montreux.'' They lived there for
18 years, until his death in 1977 at the age of 78.
Nabokov's writings were banned in the Soviet Union at the time, but
his books were smuggled into the country. Now they are published in St.
Petersburg and Moscow; both film versions of ''Lolita'' have been shown
on Russian screens.
The V. V. Nabokov Museum opened last spring as a private enterprise
after a determined effort by a small group of Nabokov admirers. Its
space included only the Nabokov family's foyer, library, dining area and
a large meeting room. The upper two floors are occupied by Nevsky Times,
an independent daily paper of cultural and educational news.
''Getting the museum off the ground was very difficult,'' said Dr.
Vadim Potrovich Stark, its director. ''The St. Petersburg administration
said it had no funds, but if we could raise the money ourselves we had
their permission to go ahead. We slowly gained sponsors from Russian and
foreign sources. We're now planning an international conference in
April, putting together an educational program for students and visitors
and trying to make a film about the museum.''
A seedy luxury is visible in the carved wooden ceilings, fireplaces,
piano and period furniture, some of which resembles the century-old
originals. In the largest room there is a long table with dozens of
high-backed chairs, once used for meetings conducted by Nabokov's
father, who was a leader of the independent Constitutional Democratic
Party before World War I. Nabokov had boxing and fencing lessons in that
room.
A permanent exhibition illustrates Nabokov's life in Russia, England,
Germany, France, the United States and Switzerland. Dangling from the
ceiling is a rather primitive painting of the Nabokov family's coat of
arms, two fierce lions and a raised arm holding a sword aloft. A second
painting shows a forlorn but accurately detailed butterfly drawn by
Nabokov himself. There are photographs of the Nabokov family and their
three former country houses. The photographs were donated by Nabokov's
son, Dmitri, and Nabokov's sister, Elena.
Three groups support the museum: the Nabokov Foundation in St.
Petersburg; DORN, a small publishing house that issues Nabokov's books
as well as those of Pushkin and other Russians, and a privately owned
Internet provider called Computer Net that works with museums. There
are a couple of Russian movie posters under a glass case showing Jeremy
Irons as Humbert Humbert in the recent film version of ''Lolita.'' While
he was in Russia for the opening of the movie last year, Dmitri Nabokov
visited his grandfather's mansion and admired the work being to
establish the museum.
During a recent telephone conversation with Dmitri Nabokov at his
home in Montreux, he commented on the two movie versions of ''Lolita.''
''The old Stanley Kubrick film was not bad, but my father felt that it
had nothing to do with his novel,'' he said. ''The current film by
Adrian Lyne is more faithful to the book.''
Through his own Nabokov Literary Foundation, Dmitri Nabokov has been
coordinating a number of events honoring his father in Russia, Europe
and the United States. There is to be a traveling exhibition in Europe,
a colloquium of scholars in St. Petersburg, discussions at Town Hall in
New York and an exhibition in the Berg Collection at the New York Public
Library in Manhattan.
Where will he be at birthday time?
''I'll be celebrating my father's two birthdays in two different
places,'' he said. Two?
''Yes,'' he replied. ''I'll be in St. Petersburg on April 10; that's
his birthday on the old calendar. And I'll be back in Montreux on April
22, where the town is planning big doings in his honor. Actually, my
father considered April 23d his real birthday, abiding by the new
calendar. Wherever, 1999 is going to be a Nabokov year.''