Subject
Re: PF narrator? (fwd)
Date
Body
----
EDITOR's NOTE. Tim Henderson asks that his immediately prior note be
ignored. The item below replaces it.
-------------------------------------------------------------
From: Tim Henderson <thenders@mail.lanline.com>
I'm enjoying this thread hugely and it's a tribute to the concept of
this list that a VN fan like myself can watch these issues being worked
out by the pros.
Once informed by the Timon quote below, I don't see how you can argue
that Shade or Kinbote invented the other.
You'd have to accept the obvious, that Kinbote has stolen the light of
Shade's popularity for his own purposes.
Although, of course, you'd have to see it as a joke, a coincidental
link-and-bobolink in the world of the novel, since the title is chosen
by Shade as a 'moondrop thingum' long before Kinbote tries to steal into
his limelight.
Besides the "light" of pure publicity, I think what Kinbote lacks, and
Shade radiates in abundance, is moral or ethical superiority. Kinbote's
Christianity and Shade's atheism (I'm a Christian myself so I'm not
bashing ) is meant to make sure we don't see this contrast in
theological terms.
It's true that many gifts are heaped on Kinbote -- he may have more
flashes of genius than Shade, although I'm not convinced yet that his
soaring melodies are no better than homespun New England artifacts --
In his letters to Wilson, VN mentions that he sometimes enjoys reading
criticism, not because it may illuminate the work in question, but
because it may be a little masterpiece of wit in its own right.
Allow me to indulge my cross-interest in Wallace Stevens with his
allusion to the Timon quote, from 'The Man With the Blue Guitar' ca.
1936--do you suppose VN saw it?
It is the sun that shares our works.
The moons shares nothing. It is a sea.
When shall I come to say of the sun,
It is a sea; it share nothing;
The sun no longer shares our works
And the earth is alive with creeping men,
Mechanical beetles never quite warm?
Donald Barton Johnson wrote:
> ----
> From: Patrick Nolan <pnolan@animalwelfare.com>
>
> A few stray Pale Fire thoughts...
>
> The fairy-tale atmosphere of the Zemblan king's life and daring
> escape is radically different from the "homespun" Appalachian tone of
> Shade's poem. However, I think it's worth pointing out that Kinbote's
>
> tale has no outright physical impossibilities, whereas Shade's poem
> has
> a domestic ghost, a phantasmal barnlight, a medically dubious
> near-death
> experience, and speculation on how a remarried widower would feel in
> heaven. Now who seems more believable?
>
> About "Shakespearean intertextualities" in addition to this from Timon
>
> of Athens:
>
> "The suns a thief, and with his great attraction
> Robs the vast sea: the moons an arrant thief,
> And her pale fire she snatches from the sun:
>
> ...most appropriate for the notion that Kinbote snatches Shade's fire.
>
> But there's also King Hamlet's
>
> "The glow-worm shows the matin to be near,
> And gins to pale his uneffectual fire"
>
> Does this have any relevance?
>
> Lastly, something that has always perplexed me is the overlap of
> characters between Pnin, Pale Fire, and Lolita. Of course Wordsmith's
>
> ridiculous bald professor is our dear Timofey ("about whom the less
> said
> the better,") but what's the timeline look like?
> What happens between Pnin's stint at Waindell and his hiring at
> Wordsmith? Is there any connection between the narrator of Pnin, his
> dark doings during Timofey's last days at Waindell, and the mysterious
>
> Botkin? And what about Prof. Starover Blue?
> Are these academics meant to be consistent from book to book?
> Could one map out their various careers with anything like realism?
>
> Puzzled as ever,
>
> Patrick Nolan
EDITOR's NOTE. Tim Henderson asks that his immediately prior note be
ignored. The item below replaces it.
-------------------------------------------------------------
From: Tim Henderson <thenders@mail.lanline.com>
I'm enjoying this thread hugely and it's a tribute to the concept of
this list that a VN fan like myself can watch these issues being worked
out by the pros.
Once informed by the Timon quote below, I don't see how you can argue
that Shade or Kinbote invented the other.
You'd have to accept the obvious, that Kinbote has stolen the light of
Shade's popularity for his own purposes.
Although, of course, you'd have to see it as a joke, a coincidental
link-and-bobolink in the world of the novel, since the title is chosen
by Shade as a 'moondrop thingum' long before Kinbote tries to steal into
his limelight.
Besides the "light" of pure publicity, I think what Kinbote lacks, and
Shade radiates in abundance, is moral or ethical superiority. Kinbote's
Christianity and Shade's atheism (I'm a Christian myself so I'm not
bashing ) is meant to make sure we don't see this contrast in
theological terms.
It's true that many gifts are heaped on Kinbote -- he may have more
flashes of genius than Shade, although I'm not convinced yet that his
soaring melodies are no better than homespun New England artifacts --
In his letters to Wilson, VN mentions that he sometimes enjoys reading
criticism, not because it may illuminate the work in question, but
because it may be a little masterpiece of wit in its own right.
Allow me to indulge my cross-interest in Wallace Stevens with his
allusion to the Timon quote, from 'The Man With the Blue Guitar' ca.
1936--do you suppose VN saw it?
It is the sun that shares our works.
The moons shares nothing. It is a sea.
When shall I come to say of the sun,
It is a sea; it share nothing;
The sun no longer shares our works
And the earth is alive with creeping men,
Mechanical beetles never quite warm?
Donald Barton Johnson wrote:
> ----
> From: Patrick Nolan <pnolan@animalwelfare.com>
>
> A few stray Pale Fire thoughts...
>
> The fairy-tale atmosphere of the Zemblan king's life and daring
> escape is radically different from the "homespun" Appalachian tone of
> Shade's poem. However, I think it's worth pointing out that Kinbote's
>
> tale has no outright physical impossibilities, whereas Shade's poem
> has
> a domestic ghost, a phantasmal barnlight, a medically dubious
> near-death
> experience, and speculation on how a remarried widower would feel in
> heaven. Now who seems more believable?
>
> About "Shakespearean intertextualities" in addition to this from Timon
>
> of Athens:
>
> "The suns a thief, and with his great attraction
> Robs the vast sea: the moons an arrant thief,
> And her pale fire she snatches from the sun:
>
> ...most appropriate for the notion that Kinbote snatches Shade's fire.
>
> But there's also King Hamlet's
>
> "The glow-worm shows the matin to be near,
> And gins to pale his uneffectual fire"
>
> Does this have any relevance?
>
> Lastly, something that has always perplexed me is the overlap of
> characters between Pnin, Pale Fire, and Lolita. Of course Wordsmith's
>
> ridiculous bald professor is our dear Timofey ("about whom the less
> said
> the better,") but what's the timeline look like?
> What happens between Pnin's stint at Waindell and his hiring at
> Wordsmith? Is there any connection between the narrator of Pnin, his
> dark doings during Timofey's last days at Waindell, and the mysterious
>
> Botkin? And what about Prof. Starover Blue?
> Are these academics meant to be consistent from book to book?
> Could one map out their various careers with anything like realism?
>
> Puzzled as ever,
>
> Patrick Nolan