Stan Kelly
to Matt on “
pulling out arbitrary strings of text and juggling their letters is unlikely to
contribute to serious literary analysis…
Nabokov indulges in many forms of word play (puns, mis-allusions,
rhyming-slang, acrostics, spoonerisms, anagrams) insignificant and short-lived
tics and tricks. Future generations will be as puzzled as we are today by
Shakespeare’s dated verbal jokes!”
JM: Perhaps jokes are quicker to get dated
because here language is at its most lively, malicious and versatile? To dwell
on them too long for decoding is worse than teasing out Freudian recondite Viennese
symbols.
Stan has acquainted me with aibophobia,
but I lack the correct reference right now: I’m sure it’s not
indicative of spelling mistakes in an ideogram.