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To the List,

I have often wondered about the name John Rae, Jr (preface Lolita). I sometimes came across the name John Rae linked to Arctic exploration, but "Jr" was never there.

I am reading Ken McGoogan's Fatal Passage: the Story of John Rae, the Arctic Hero Time Forgot and it turns out that John Rae was the son of "John Rae, Sr," and so, though never referred to that way, he really was  John Rae, Jr.

Other names linked to Arctic exploration occasionally turn up in Nabokov's work (Amundsen in Ada, for example) and I think I that there is a play about Scott? or am I dreaming?

Carolyn