A.Bouazza offers
M.Couturier "the scan of a few
pages containing all the information you require" from the Index Librorum Prohibitorum by
Pisanus Fraxi.
" The French
translation in question is of Nocturnal Revels; or, the History of
King's-Place, and other
Modern Nunneries [...],1779.
Charlotte Hayes is mentioned on
page 257, under "Fashionale Lectures: composed and delivered with Birch Discipline [...]
the extracts cited are very
interesting when compared to Eric Veen's Villa Venus. "
M.Roth,
to M.C: "Your revelations concerning Charlotte Hayes are
interesting indeed. Now that I've done some Googling, I see that CH was "the
most famous madam of her day" and particularly was known for her stable of
"Nymphs." and offered "a few links of interest". Priscilla
Meyer describes "Dieter's annotations and indeed his
whole oeuvre are prodigious and inspiring.", but she notes that "When I
was working on my book on Pale Fire in the mid-eighties, there was no
internet..."
JM: Although I frequently resort
to google-information the experience of searching through
"material" books is, for me, something indispensable - and I don't mean the
factual information, valuable in either way, but the actual,
reverential sensation of leafing through old and rare books ( I learned
that Dante used to wear formal clothing and gloves whenever he
sat down to read), or the muscle-spindle firing when we stretch arms and legs to
pick out a desired volume from the shelf. Therefore I was doubly
happy to get both: A.Bouazza's important scan and M.Roth's
internet "links" with their conjectures
and P.Meyer's return to Pale Fire ["My book does
discuss the Kongs-skugg-sja, Hodinski, Ossian, The Song of Igor's Campaign...as
part of a system of Kinbote's readings...my accumulation of annotations suggests
that Nabokov reviews three intertwined strains of the history of the North for
1000 years that culminate in his own tragedy"].
btw: while I was reading a
translation of "The Seafarer" I found a quotation on the
back-cover, inserted by its translator into Portuguese, Rodrigo Garcia
Lopes, where he mentions Charles Harrison
Wallace. Isn't he a participant of
the VN-List?
Tom
Rymor's popping-up after a long silence to offer his
"Seasonally, lang may yer lum reek..."[...] became a nice
New Year presence... As "a native speaker of the
so-called "Lallans", born in Ayrshire," the wrote
to "remind Nabokophiles that the young VN had a Scots tutor, Mr
Burness.He may have been related to Robert Burness (later Burns)...and
his Jolly Beggars Cantata. I speculate that Mr Burness (who turns up
in Pale Fire under another name) introduced the young VN to
certain Lowland Scots expressions."
Knowing
how VN enjoyed Rupert Brooke's work, additional information on
Mrs.Hayes, Gay's "The Beggar's opera" or
"Coxcombe"matters, might be of interest: Brooke, Rupert.
John Webster and the Elizabethan Drama. London, John Lane,
1916. I must confess that I cannot see Charlotte as a "madam" or her
daughter in a "stable of nymphs" and this is why I'm curious to
learn more about this suggestion of "debauchery" and poor
silly Mrs. Haze-Humbert.( Or am I misguided and alone when I
find a strain of authorial cruelty in such a connection?)
To
Mary ["lalage" and "lullaby" might be "distantly
related through the Indoeuropean root *la, which means to talk or babble". This
has doubtless been pointed out before, but Nabokov's reference to Lolita as "my
Lalage" is likely an allusion to one of Horace's odes (2.5, Nondum subacta ferre
iugum valet). ]
Thank you for the
information concerning Horace and "Lalage". I'll check Willett's
translation, as you indicated. Gaining access into VN's
original sources adds an unprecedent depth to VN. If I'm not mistaken, in
a different mood, VN also brought up Horace's ode
2.14 (" Eheu fugaces, Postume, Postume, labuntur anni, nee
pietas moram/rugis et instanti senectae/adferet indomitaeque morti..").
However I cannot remember if it was hinted at in Pale Fire
or in
Ada... It will be wonderful to learn more about these
Odes.