[Frances Assa: But what makes you so sure
that Shades thoughts and beliefs are VN's own?] My first answer to F.Assa
was that I had no reason to be so sure about VN and Shade. Now I
fear I may have confused VN and...Doestoevski?
Cf. SO (Vintage
International pocket):
" I am very careful to keep my
characters beyond the limites of my own identity. Only the background of the
novel can be said to contain some biographical
touches" (p.13/14) "It is also true that some of my more responsible
characters are given some of my own ideas. There is John Shade, in Pale
Fire, the poet. He does borrow some of my own opinions[...] I can
endorse... "I loathe such things as jazz... Freud...frauds and sharks"
(p.18)
Later on he states that "John Shade in Pale Fire leads an
intense inner existence, far removed from what you call a joke. You must be
confusing me with Doestoevski" (p.119)
And, on p120-22: "The more
gifted and talkative one's characters are, the greater the chances of their
resembling the author in tone or tint of mind [...] I loathe Van Veen [...] I
suspect that Van Veen, having less control over his imagination than I,
novelized in his indulgent old age many images of his youth." (
although VN sometimes feels equally indulgent towards Van, unlike the
vehemence found in this 1969 interview)
..........................................................................................................................
(In relation to The Gift: "probably my favorite Russian poem is one that I happened to give
to my main character in that novel" (p.14))