'Sure, sure,' said Demon, wrestling with a
subtle question which only the ineptitude of a kindred conjecture had crowded
out of Marina's mind, granted it could have entered by some back door; for
ineptitude is always synonymous with multitude, and nothing is fuller than an
empty mind. (Ada, 1.38)
In his memoir essay About S. A. Tolstoy (1924),
written in defense of the writer's late widow, Gorky quotes an entry in Leo
Tolstoy's diary:
В "Дневнике юности" Толстого есть прямые
указания на его резко враждебное отношение к мысли аналитической; так, например,
в 52 г. III, 22, он записал: "Мыслей особенно много может вмещаться в одно и то
же время особенно в пустой голове". (An empty mind is
particularly prone to be overcrowded with thoughts.)
Golova being
Russian for "head," Vin (Russian spelling of the family name
Veen, of Van, Ada, Lucette, Lucette's father Dan and Dan's cousin Demon, the
father of Van and Ada) looks like "beheaded" Golovin (the surname of
Tolstoy's Ivan Ilyich*). On the other hand, pustaya golova (the phrase
used by Tolstoy in his diary entry) means "empty mind."
Many a Tolstoy follower, including Chertkov (the author of
Tolstoy's Departure), accused Sofia Andreevna of being her
husband's "evil demon" and compared her to
Xanthippe:
Теперь слышу, что скоро выйдет в свет ещё одна
книжка, написанная с тем же похвальным намерением: убедить грамотных людей мира,
что жена Льва
Толстого была его злым демоном, а подлинное имя её —
Ксантиппа. (Gorky, ibid.)
According to Demon, his aunt Kitty was married to that
dreadful old wencher Lyovka Tolstoy, the writer:
'Your dinner jacket is very nice - or,
rather it's very nice recognizing one's old tailor in one's son's clothes - like
catching oneself repeating an ancestral mannerism - for example, this (wagging
his left forefinger three times at the height of his temple), which my mother
did in casual, pacific denial; that gene missed you, but I've seen it in my
hairdresser's looking-glass when refusing to have him put Crêmlin on my bald
spot; and you know who had it too - my aunt Kitty, who married the Banker
Bolenski after divorcing that dreadful old wencher Lyovka Tolstoy, the writer.'
(1.38)
The gene that missed Van was inherited by his sister and
lover, Ada (officially, Dan's daughter):
'Oh, no,' said Ada, wagging her finger at
the height of her temple in a way she had. 'Oh, no. That pretty word [Kremlin] does not exist in Russian. A Frenchman
invented it. There is no second syllable.' (1.36)
Van, Ada and Lucette are playing a game of Flavita
(Russian Scrabble). Flavita is an anagram of alfavit
(Russ.,"alphabet"). Alfavit - 'Zerkalo zhizni' (Alphabet "The
Mirror of Life") is a chapter in Ilf and Petrov's The Twelve
Chairs (1928). On the other hand, Lev Tolstoy kak zerkalo russkoy
revolyutsii (Leo Tolstoy as a Mirror of Russian Revolution) is a
famous article by Lenin ("the Kremlin dreamer," as H. G. Wells called him).
Gorky is the author of the obituary essay Vladimir Ilyich Lenin
(1924).
The Flavita set was given to Marina's children by Baron Klim
Avidov (anagram of Vladimir Nabokov). Baron is a character in Gorky's play
Na dne (At the Bottom). On the other hand, Gorky is the
author of The Life of Klim Samgin (1925-36).
Baron Klim Avidov knocked out an English tourist who remarked
how clever it was to drop the first letter of one's name in order to use it as a
particule at the Gritz, in Venezia Rossa (1.36). Mme Gritsatsuev
("the ardent woman, a poet's dream") is a character in The Twelve
Chairs. Its sequel novel, The Golden Calf (1931), has a chapter
entitled Vasisualiy Lokhankin and his Role in the Russian
Revolution. Like old Funt, a character in The Golden Calf who
repeats: "Brian - eto golova" ("Briand has a head
indeed"), Lokhankin lives in Chernomorsk. The name of this (fictional)
city reminds one of Chernomor, the sorcerer in Pushkin's poem Ruslan
and Lyudmila (1820). The evil dwarf Chernomor has an elder brother,
golova (the still alive head of the giant who was decapitated by
Chernomor).
Pushkin's poem begins:
У лукоморья дуб зелёный;
Златая цепь на дубе том;
и днём и ночью кот учёный
всё ходит по цепи кругом.
(A green oak stands at the sea shore;
a golden chain winds around the oak;
the day and night a learned cat
walks round and round on the chain.)
The rare oak, Quercus ruslan Chat.,** with a big
chain around its trunk, grows in Ardis (2.7).
On the other hand, in VN's Invitation to a
Beheading, Quercus is a modernist novel
that Cincinnatus C reads in the fortress. The author of
Quercus is said to live on an island - perhaps, in the North Sea.
Dub being Russian for "oak," the novel's Latin title seems to hint at
Dublin, the home city of James Joyce, the author of Dubliners and
Ulysses. One of the main characters in Ulysses (and the
protagonist in Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young
Man) is Stephen Dedalus.
Son of Dedalus Veen, Walter D. Veen ("Demon") is a
Manhattan banker of ancient Anglo-Irish ancestry (1.1). Daedalus being the
father of Icarus, Demon's death in an airplane disaster (3.7) reminds one of the
Icarus myth.
*And when Van, having kissed her [Marina's] freckled hand, lowered himself on the
ivanilich*** (a kind of sighing old hassock
upholstered in leather): 'Van, dear, I wish to say something to you, because I
know I shall never have to repeat it again. Belle, with her usual flair for the
right phrase, has cited to me the cousinage-dangereux-voisinage
adage - I mean "adage," I always fluff that word - and complained
qu'on s'embrassait dans tous les coins. Is that true?' (1.37) Demon to Van: 'I can exert a certain pressure upon my
Marina. She sighs like a hassock when you sit upon her, so to speak.'
(1.38)
**chat is French for "cat;" on the other hand,
"Chat." seems to hint at Châteaubriand (whom Batyushkov used to call
Châteaubrilliant)
***Vivian Darkbloom ('Notes to Ada'): Ivanilich: a pouf plays a marvelous part in Tolstoy's The
Death of Ivan Ilyich, where it sighs deeply under a friend of the
widow's.
Alexey Sklyarenko