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PF Narrator (fwd)
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*** The "elegant summary," for which I am being praised here, was, alas,
not mine. I do not quite remember who offered it, and can go into our
archives to check. It may be simpler and faster, however, if the
true author of the summary quoted in Ben Walsh's posting reveals
him/her/self to us or if anyone happens to remember who it was and
sets our record straight. GD***
From: Ben Walsh <benw@meta.dublin.iona.ie>
I apologise for contributing too late if the consensus is that this
discussion has run its course - but the editor has given another
fifteen-odd months to come up with a definitive answer. My caveat is that,
as is no doubt apparent, I'm an amateur and enthusiast and no scholar.
I like very much Mary Bellino's idea that "what we [anti-Shadeans] are
expressing is an _aesthetic_ reaction to the idea of Shade as author of the
commentary and inventor of Kinbote/Botkin. My own view is that the book
does not work as well artistically under this schema".
The idea of having Shade behind the entire operation, as a master
puppeteer, I find jarring and unwelcome. Much is said about Shade's
"homeliness" and there is a kind of contemptuous touch to opinion of the
poem itself; Brian Boyd quotes the phrases "fireside poet" and "eminently
Appalachian, rather old-fashioned narrative" - the argument being that VN
would not have have classed Shade as the "greatest of invented poets" based
on the 999 lines of the poem "Pale Fire" alone.
Shade is a great invented poet because his poem has lent itself to such
varied interpretations; from Kinbote's paranoid transferance onto the text
to our own discussions in this forum. Shade is a great invented poet
_because he is invented_ and can be viewed so clearly from within the
sphere of Kinbote's madness. Had the "Pale Fire" come out in our sphere of
reality as a slim volume with an introduction by the poet or a level-headed
colleague at a humdrum university, it would have been "homely" and
"old-fashioned" and the poet behind, always behind, Robert Frost.
Brian Boyd wants the character of Shade to be more deceptive - I think that
this is true deceit, because it is a deception that goes to the core of the
nature of Shade's existence. The deceit of which Brian accuses Shade is,
for my taste - aesthetics again! - too lying, cynical and manipulative.
This position may seem a little Jesuitical, but there is another, simpler
argument why that there can be no other reason Shade is the greatest
invented poet. If Shade is a fictional poet whose works unwittingly lends
itself to paranoid interpretation by Kinbote, then he is brilliant. If he
wrote the whole book - forward, notes and all - he is no longer an
invention; he is Nabokov. We *know* who wrote the entire work. Nabokov did.
There is no space in which to fit a secondary author; there is no universe,
no layer that exists in between the ultimate writer and his creation. Myles
na gCopaleen - who knew more about layering reality than anyone bar VN -
played tricks as devilishly clever, but would never have withheld such a
vital clue. In "The Third Policeman" we have footnotes to a first-person
narration of hell, and "At-Swim-Two-Birds" provides us with layers and
different realities interfering with one another, but there are always
clues enough to find out where we really are. For all the coincidences and
wordplay of Brian's argument, we're lacking a single real touchstone to
ground Shade the poet at a level encompassing both the poem and the
commentary. Nabokov always left us just enough clues - Brian's own
wonderful treatment resolution of the ownership of the "faded blue eyes and
long lip" in "Bend Sinister" shows this.
I think the coincidences of which Brian makes much are just that. The
sharing of birthdays is a red herring - the chances of two individuals
sharing a birthday are far from astronomical, and VN the scientist knew
that. Gradus, being a Kinbote invention, will of course share that birthday
also. It is almost Jesuitical again, but the other coincidences and plays
on words could be marks left by the creator. It is because VN has created
the entire universe inhabited by Shade & Kinbote that those things exist -
he has left his unmistakable stamp on the entire work.
So, for all that, I end up agreeing wholeheartedly with Galya Diment's
elegant summary of the anti-Shadean position:
"An insane college professor moves next door to the object of his
obsession, formulates a complex world involving a self-fulfilling
assassination prophesy, as schizophrenics are wont to do, and afterwards
publishes his apology."
Of course, there is more than one way to skin a cat. If VN has invented a
world, the dinosaur bones can be either the remains of long-extinct beasts
or toys he buried as a diversion. Likewise, when looking to the title, I
tend to think not of Timon of Athens, but, bearing in mind Brian's thoughts
re. larvae and flies:
Fare thee well at once!
The glow-worm shows the matin to be near,
And 'gins to pale his uneffectual fire:
Adieu, adieu! Hamlet, remember me.
The prince, of course, wished to effect his quietus with a bare bodkin.
There's much confusion about who should have been dead and who shouldn't at
the end of Hamlet, too.
ben
not mine. I do not quite remember who offered it, and can go into our
archives to check. It may be simpler and faster, however, if the
true author of the summary quoted in Ben Walsh's posting reveals
him/her/self to us or if anyone happens to remember who it was and
sets our record straight. GD***
From: Ben Walsh <benw@meta.dublin.iona.ie>
I apologise for contributing too late if the consensus is that this
discussion has run its course - but the editor has given another
fifteen-odd months to come up with a definitive answer. My caveat is that,
as is no doubt apparent, I'm an amateur and enthusiast and no scholar.
I like very much Mary Bellino's idea that "what we [anti-Shadeans] are
expressing is an _aesthetic_ reaction to the idea of Shade as author of the
commentary and inventor of Kinbote/Botkin. My own view is that the book
does not work as well artistically under this schema".
The idea of having Shade behind the entire operation, as a master
puppeteer, I find jarring and unwelcome. Much is said about Shade's
"homeliness" and there is a kind of contemptuous touch to opinion of the
poem itself; Brian Boyd quotes the phrases "fireside poet" and "eminently
Appalachian, rather old-fashioned narrative" - the argument being that VN
would not have have classed Shade as the "greatest of invented poets" based
on the 999 lines of the poem "Pale Fire" alone.
Shade is a great invented poet because his poem has lent itself to such
varied interpretations; from Kinbote's paranoid transferance onto the text
to our own discussions in this forum. Shade is a great invented poet
_because he is invented_ and can be viewed so clearly from within the
sphere of Kinbote's madness. Had the "Pale Fire" come out in our sphere of
reality as a slim volume with an introduction by the poet or a level-headed
colleague at a humdrum university, it would have been "homely" and
"old-fashioned" and the poet behind, always behind, Robert Frost.
Brian Boyd wants the character of Shade to be more deceptive - I think that
this is true deceit, because it is a deception that goes to the core of the
nature of Shade's existence. The deceit of which Brian accuses Shade is,
for my taste - aesthetics again! - too lying, cynical and manipulative.
This position may seem a little Jesuitical, but there is another, simpler
argument why that there can be no other reason Shade is the greatest
invented poet. If Shade is a fictional poet whose works unwittingly lends
itself to paranoid interpretation by Kinbote, then he is brilliant. If he
wrote the whole book - forward, notes and all - he is no longer an
invention; he is Nabokov. We *know* who wrote the entire work. Nabokov did.
There is no space in which to fit a secondary author; there is no universe,
no layer that exists in between the ultimate writer and his creation. Myles
na gCopaleen - who knew more about layering reality than anyone bar VN -
played tricks as devilishly clever, but would never have withheld such a
vital clue. In "The Third Policeman" we have footnotes to a first-person
narration of hell, and "At-Swim-Two-Birds" provides us with layers and
different realities interfering with one another, but there are always
clues enough to find out where we really are. For all the coincidences and
wordplay of Brian's argument, we're lacking a single real touchstone to
ground Shade the poet at a level encompassing both the poem and the
commentary. Nabokov always left us just enough clues - Brian's own
wonderful treatment resolution of the ownership of the "faded blue eyes and
long lip" in "Bend Sinister" shows this.
I think the coincidences of which Brian makes much are just that. The
sharing of birthdays is a red herring - the chances of two individuals
sharing a birthday are far from astronomical, and VN the scientist knew
that. Gradus, being a Kinbote invention, will of course share that birthday
also. It is almost Jesuitical again, but the other coincidences and plays
on words could be marks left by the creator. It is because VN has created
the entire universe inhabited by Shade & Kinbote that those things exist -
he has left his unmistakable stamp on the entire work.
So, for all that, I end up agreeing wholeheartedly with Galya Diment's
elegant summary of the anti-Shadean position:
"An insane college professor moves next door to the object of his
obsession, formulates a complex world involving a self-fulfilling
assassination prophesy, as schizophrenics are wont to do, and afterwards
publishes his apology."
Of course, there is more than one way to skin a cat. If VN has invented a
world, the dinosaur bones can be either the remains of long-extinct beasts
or toys he buried as a diversion. Likewise, when looking to the title, I
tend to think not of Timon of Athens, but, bearing in mind Brian's thoughts
re. larvae and flies:
Fare thee well at once!
The glow-worm shows the matin to be near,
And 'gins to pale his uneffectual fire:
Adieu, adieu! Hamlet, remember me.
The prince, of course, wished to effect his quietus with a bare bodkin.
There's much confusion about who should have been dead and who shouldn't at
the end of Hamlet, too.
ben