A. Sklyarenko: "I hope someone with better
English than mine will translate this passage for you, if it doesn't exist
in English (in Conclusive Evidence). The word шулер is implicitly
present in Ada ("I have often wondered why the Russian for it... is the
same as the German for 'schoolboy' minus the umlaut..." 1.28). As you know,
German for 'schoolboy' is Schüler."
JM: Great Hevans,
Alexey... You've mizzled me now in pluncketty shoes and
arms. I hope there's a volunteer to
translate the passage you indicate, for Wiki informs me that "Speak,Memory", originally written in
English, is an imperfect "version" of the Russian...*
Peter Lubin mentioned Viktor
Shklovskij's coinage of "ostranenie" or "making strange," in
Zemblan "Kickshaws and Motley." He added, in the same
vane: "A pun makes strange, and so does a paragram, or even a slip or a
lipograph, as guests at a certain literary dinner have reason to know. What
doesn't make strange, estrange, strangify a book, if the author is a genuine
artist? No, leave those terms alone. Avoid textbook truth. A fine nib and a
nimble wit--that's what you want."**
...............................................
* - "Nabokov himself
translated into Russian two books that he had originally written in English,
Conclusive Evidence, and Lolita. The first "translation" was made because of
Nabokov's feeling of imperfection in the English version. Writing the book, he
noted that he needed to translate his own memories into English, and to spend a
lot of time explaining things which are well-known in Russia; then he decided to
re-write the book once again, in his first native language, and after that he
made the final version, Speak, Memory (Nabokov first wanted to name it "Speak,
Mnemosyne")."
** - I quote him...but this doesn't
mean that I understood a word! No "fine nib and nimble wits," in my
case.