I also wrote: ..."visible smudges that remind one of an internal diminutive universe dilating in his breast". Metaphors often encompass contrasting images ( shadows in the lungs dilating into a turbulent and deadly internal sky) 

 

NG added: "As to whether we need to medicalise poetry ... there's been a fair amount of medical interest in parts of PF recently...why not go the whole way and medicalise it as thoroughly as possible?"

 

I wonder how wikipedia-inspired medical information could be help us to "medicalise it as thoroughly as possible".

Despite the invaluable help we get from List participants who are also mathematicians, biologists, linguists, physicists, bike riders... and whose clarifications often settle issues that would have remained vague without their aid, I prefer to rely mainly in the textbooks VN himself consulted ( whenever it is possible to learn which) when I try to picture what he intended to express ( and did express) in his fiction.  

From the ongoing debates about neuroanatomy and multiple personality disordes as seen in "Pale Fire" I realize I'm once again part of a minority.  But this is my vote.

Jansy