EDITOR'S NOTE. Andrew Langridge has recently
completed a dissertion THE SHATTERED WORLD OF NABOKOV'S BEND SINISTER (U of
Aukland, NZ) that is by far the most detaild analysis of that book.
-----------------------------------------------
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, September 05, 2002 11:03 PM
Subject: Re: Pale Fire Solutions: Hazel vs Hyde. Problems in
&Alternatives to Boyd on PF
I think the reason that this Jekyll/Hyde interpretation of
Pale Fire is (for me) so unconvincing, is that it's a solution in search
of evidence, rather than a solution that has arisen from the evidence of the
text. If one can only find six pieces of evidence in the novel to support a
given interpretation of a novel seething with significant detail, then that
solution is surely suspect.
Perhaps Brian's solution is not complete or
watertight. He admits as much in his book (and is well aware of my skepticism
regarding certain elements of it). But at least it is a solution that attempts
to account for the full range of oddities that one finds in this marvellously
odd novel, rather than an ad hoc theory with a minimum of evidence adduced in
support (and no attention paid to contradictory details).
Of the six
scanty items enlisted below, two can immediately be ruled out of bounds. The
Lectures on Literature cross-reference is anachronistic in at least two
dimensions. VN would not insert a cryptic allusion into one of his lectures just
so he could exploit it in an undreamt-of work some several years later. Nor
would he base a crucial clue on a cross-reference to an earlier piece of writing
that, at the time, he had no definite intention of publishing. If there's one
thing that Brian's work in so many corners of Nabokoviana has established, it's
that VN, though ever demanding of them, always played fair with his
readers.
The cheval glass can be similarly shattered: they are a
Nabokovian allusion, not a Stevensonian one, and appear in The Defense
(Vintage, 169) and Laughter in the Dark (Vintage, 124) as well. They
further feature, in Gallic drag, in Despair (Vintage, 64), by which time
they have shaded into a delicate lepidopterous reference which may or may not
have nothing to do with Bend Sinister. . .
Also, does it strike
anybody else as odd that a detail man like VN would truck with "instinctual"
readings of his - or anyone else's - novels?
Andrew
Langridge
----------
>From: "D. Barton Johnson"
<chtodel@cox.net>
>To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
>Subject:
Fw: Pale Fire Solutions: Hazel vs Hyde. Problems in &Alternatives to Boyd on
PF
>Date: Thu, 5 Sep 2002 6:59 AM
>
>----- Original
Message -----
>From: "Carolyn Kunin"
<chaiselongue@earthlink.net>
>To: "Vladimir Nabokov Forum"
<NABOKV-L@listserv.ucsb.edu>
>>
>> -----------------
Message requiring your approval (59
>lines) ------------------
>>
Problems with Boyd's Hazel-solution to Pale Fire
>>
>> 1)
Boyd's connection of the Toothwort White (isn't "toothwort" in the
barn
>> message?) and the Atalanta would have been a lovely discovery,
but Boyd
>has
>> to go through a lot of contortions in order to
force this to solve the
>> puzzle posed by Pale Fire. There should be a
more instinctual solution to
>> be found - at least we should look for
it.
>>
>> 2) If Hazel's manipulations solved the puzzle, the
puzzle would be solved.
>> There would be no more to discuss.
Fortunately I think the next level will
>> point to another level,
which the Hazel solution does not. Boyd himself
>> suspects
this.
>>
>> and 3) If Hazel is pulling all the strings behind
both the poem and the
>> commentary, then Hazel = VN, an unsatisfactory
solution.
>>
>> Argument for 'Shade is to Kinbote as Jekyll is
to Hyde' solution:
>>
>> There are at least six clues pointing
to the identity of Kinbote and Hyde:
>>
>> 1) meaning of name
Kinbote (see Boyd's footnote in LoA edition). One of
>the
>>
first sightings of Mr Hyde in RLS's story is when he is cornered
and
>forced
>> to pay reparations for injury he has
inflicted;
>>
>> 2) There is a reference to another Edward
Hyde (identified as a reference
>by
>> Boyd in a footnote in
Library of America edition);
>>
>> 3) Kinbote as author of
book on surnames and reference to such a book in
>> VN's essay on
Jekyll & Hyde in "Lectures on Literature";
>>
>> 4) There
is a reference to another RLS story, "The Bottle Imp" in the note
>> to
line 171
>>
>> 5) The clue of Mr Shade and Dr Kinbote;
and
>>
>> 6) the cheval glass in the palace (note to line 80)
comes from Hyde's
>> lodgings.
>>
>> One of the
nicest aspects of this solution is that it can be solved by any
>>
reader with general knowledge and it is an instinctual
solution;
>>
>> This solution allows us to discover another
level of meaning in the text
>of
>> the poem and in some of the
notes to the commentary (I have been trying to
>> draw attention to
these in recent postings);
>>
>> This solution points to
another problem which we may now try to solve. If
>> Kinbote = Shade =
Gradus, the reader can now tackle the puzzling nature of
>> time in the
novel. I suspect that the solution to this will be "a fugue."
>>
Multiple personality is a form of fugue state (a term less used in
>>
psychology now than at the time Pale Fire was written, and which term
has
>> the original twin meanings of chase and flight). Of course a
musical
>fugue
>> is a complicated form in which the same themes
and motifs chase and flee
>> from each other, overlapping and repeating
to form complex
>> inter-relationships, inversions, subversions and so
on. Kinbote chased by
>> Gradus chasing Shade may turn out to be a
fugue in two voices (Shade's &
>> Kinbote's) or three (+ Nabokov's
?).
>>
>> Carolyn Kunin
>>