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Reading Rattner on Terra
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Julian Connolly writes:
Brian's commentary on H. G. Wells's "The Plattner Story" made me think that
Wells's work may have left traces in another Nabokov novel, *The Eye.* The
narrator becomes something of a "Watcher of the Living" after he supposedly
shoots himself and begins to observe the newcomer Smurov. In describing how
his consciousness continues to work after death, he writes that he now knew
"that a sinner's torment in the afterworld consists precisely in that his
tenacious mind cannot find peace until it manages to unravel the complex
consequences of his reckless terrestrial actions" (23). Cf. "we may still
have to witness the working out of the train of consequences we have laid"
in the Wells's story.
--
Susan Elizabeth Sweeney
Co-Editor, NABOKV-L
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Brian's commentary on H. G. Wells's "The Plattner Story" made me think that
Wells's work may have left traces in another Nabokov novel, *The Eye.* The
narrator becomes something of a "Watcher of the Living" after he supposedly
shoots himself and begins to observe the newcomer Smurov. In describing how
his consciousness continues to work after death, he writes that he now knew
"that a sinner's torment in the afterworld consists precisely in that his
tenacious mind cannot find peace until it manages to unravel the complex
consequences of his reckless terrestrial actions" (23). Cf. "we may still
have to witness the working out of the train of consequences we have laid"
in the Wells's story.
--
Susan Elizabeth Sweeney
Co-Editor, NABOKV-L
Search archive with Google:
http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=site:listserv.ucsb.edu&HL=en
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Visit "Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
Manage subscription options: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/