In a message dated 28/09/2006 14:29:00 GMT Standard Time,
dorazander@TERRA.COM.BR writes:
A. Stadlen asked: "As a general rule, is it not crucial not to fall for
the symmetries and circularities proposed by self-absorbed narcissists
like Hermann and Kinbote? A large part of VN's challenge to the
reader is not to be seduced by such unreliable (to put it absurdly
mildly) narrators..." I'm curious to learn why
A.Stadlen thinks that "symmetries and circularities" are merely the ones we
find in VN's "self-absorbed narcissists" ( A.Appel.Jr. discussed this in
relation to "an escape from solipsism").
Jansy
But I don't think so. I never said this. Of course there are beautiful
symmetries in nature and art and mathematics, and real circularities as in
Finnegans Wake and VN's circular short story. But there are also unreliable ones
proposed by unreliable people, such as some of VN's narrators, who try to
reduce otherness to sameness.
VN did (in Strong Opinions, or was it Lectures on Literature, or Speak
Memory, or perhaps all three?) praise the Hegelian-dialectical spiral as
something that meant much to him. That is something different from either
symmetry or circularity.
Anthony
Stadlen