Subject
More VN in The New Yorker and Pale Fire (fwd)
From
Date
Body
From: Juan Martinez <pigbodine@hotmail.com>
Hi!
This week's issue of The New Yorker has an article titled "Speak,
Memory," on how the modern world is turning us all into eidetics. If
anyone (other than myself) is keeping track: this is at least the sixth
consecutive Nabokovian reference in that magazine this year---which is
weird, to say the least, but awfully fun.
"should i read the poem first, the commentary first,
or should i flip back and forth?"
Follow Kinbote's advice and buy three copies---or cut the one you have
into thirds. Just kidding. My first reading of _Pale Fire_ was not the
best, but it worked: I read the prologue, glanced at the first few
lines of the first canto, then skipped to the notes and read them
straight through---it makes for an uneven, slanted take on the whole
work but lets the slapstick shine through (but you do miss many of the
subtleties and most of the curious interplay between imagined biographer
and actual poet [and probable author of the very funny, very misleading
commentary]). The cantos stand on their own, however. And so do the
notes. The best way is to read the cantos, then go back to the prologue
and to the commentary---and *then* following the notations backwards
(reading the note, glancing at the line referred to, then heading back
towards the meat of the story). This is one way. I suspect that each
_Pale Fire_ reader has two or three different ways of tackling it.
Regards,
Juan
------------------------------------------------------
"Speak softly
Drive a Sherman tank,
Laugh hard,
It's a long way to the bank."
---They Might Be Giants, _Rhythm Section Want Ad_
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com
Hi!
This week's issue of The New Yorker has an article titled "Speak,
Memory," on how the modern world is turning us all into eidetics. If
anyone (other than myself) is keeping track: this is at least the sixth
consecutive Nabokovian reference in that magazine this year---which is
weird, to say the least, but awfully fun.
"should i read the poem first, the commentary first,
or should i flip back and forth?"
Follow Kinbote's advice and buy three copies---or cut the one you have
into thirds. Just kidding. My first reading of _Pale Fire_ was not the
best, but it worked: I read the prologue, glanced at the first few
lines of the first canto, then skipped to the notes and read them
straight through---it makes for an uneven, slanted take on the whole
work but lets the slapstick shine through (but you do miss many of the
subtleties and most of the curious interplay between imagined biographer
and actual poet [and probable author of the very funny, very misleading
commentary]). The cantos stand on their own, however. And so do the
notes. The best way is to read the cantos, then go back to the prologue
and to the commentary---and *then* following the notations backwards
(reading the note, glancing at the line referred to, then heading back
towards the meat of the story). This is one way. I suspect that each
_Pale Fire_ reader has two or three different ways of tackling it.
Regards,
Juan
------------------------------------------------------
"Speak softly
Drive a Sherman tank,
Laugh hard,
It's a long way to the bank."
---They Might Be Giants, _Rhythm Section Want Ad_
______________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com