----- Original Message -----
Sent: Saturday, November 23, 2002 6:15 PM
Subject: Re: reply to Mr Pultorak and a challenge PALE
FIRE
It was common, in woman's dormitories and in
sorority houses, for gentlemen arriving to pick up there dates to stop at the
reception area fro which a call would be placed to the woman's room. The woman
would then come down to the reception area to greet her date. Guys did not go
into living spaces or to women's rooms even in the late fifties. Of course the
popular women's phones were ringing every two minutes on ball nights or other
occasions.
This may indicate that the writer assumes we
understand that Hazel was in a women's dormitory, at some point, even if
her parents lived in that town. This, too, would not be unusual, even though the
case has been made that it would be more economically convenient for Hazel to
have lived at home. And it seems as if her arrival at home on the night of the
Dean date was expected by her parents.
As for the nun disguise rumor mentioned in the
commentary and the future nun in the poem, the time frame doesn't lend itself to
their being the same person. If an actual King Charles had escaped from Zembla
disguised as a nun, he could not have arrived at Wordsmith in the form of a
"future nun" while Hazel attended school. He would have been a past faux nun,
not a nun-to-be.
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Saturday, November 23, 2002 12:09
PM
Subject: Fw: reply to Mr Pultorak and a
challenge PALE FIRE
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Friday, November 22, 2002 7:21 PM
Subject: reply to Mr Pultorak and a challenge
Dear Mr Pultorak,
I think we are getting very close here
to slaying a dead horse, but if Shade
writes
The telephone that rang before a
ball
Every
two minutes in Sorosa Hall ....
it seems to me that he knows a bit
too much of what goes on there.
Carolyn Kunin
p.s. A challenge
to those who believe that the roommate is Hazel's:
Do you see any significance in the nun who turns up in
Kinbote's commentary to line 894 ("the widely circulated stuff about the
nun") or any relationship between this nun and the roommate who has become
one?