Max Mispel, the
poet and critic who discerned in Van's novel Letters from
Terra the influence of Osberg and Ben Sirine, is a member of the
German Department at Goluba University (Ada, 2.2).
Golub' being Russian for "pigeon, dove", "Goluba
University" seems to hint at Columbia University in the City of New York
(columbus/columba is Latin for "pigeon, dove").
On the other hand, goluba is a form of golubchik (coll.; as mode of
address), "my dear." In Ilf & Petrov's "The Twelve Chairs"
(Chapter Eleven, "The Mirror-of-Life Index") Ostap Bender
addresses Varfolomey Korobeinikov (the head of the records department in
Stargorod) goluba:
-- Голуба,-- пропел Остап,-- ей-богу, клянусь
честью покойного батюшки. Рад душой, но нету, забыл взять с текущего
счёта.
"My dear," crooned Ostap, "I swear by my late father, I'd be
glad to, but I haven't any [money]; I forgot to draw any from my current
account."
Herr Mispel, who liked to air his
authors... (2.2)
Chapter Eleven "Alfavit* - zerkalo zhizni" ("The
Mirror-of-Life Index") of the Ilf & Petrov
novel begins:
На второй день компаньоны убедились, что жить в
дворницкой больше неудобно. Бурчал Тихон, совершенно обалдевший после того, как
увидел барина сначала черноусым, потом зеленоусым, а под конец и совсем без
усов. Спать было не на чем. В дворницкой стоял запах гниющего навоза,
распространяемый новыми валенками Тихона. Старые валенки стояли в углу и воздуха
тоже не озонировали.
The next day the partners saw that it was no longer
convenient to live in the caretaker's room. Tikhon** kept muttering away to
himself and had become completely stupid, having seen his master
first with a black moustache, then with a green one, and finally with
no moustache at all. There was nothing to sleep on.The room stank of rotting
manure, brought in on Tikhon's new felt boots. His old ones
stood in the corner and did not help to purify the air,
either.
On the same day Bender and Vorob'yaninov (alias "Konrad
Karlovich Michelson") move to "Sorbonne": Последовало
быстрое согласие, и концессионеры, не попрощавшись с Тихоном, выбрались на
улицу. Остановились они в меблированных комнатах "Сорбонна". (There followed immediate consent, and without saying goodbye to
Tikhon, the concessionaires went out into the street. They stopped at the
Sorbonne Furnished Rooms.) Sorbonne is the University in Paris (on Antiterra,
aka Lute).
His [Van's] new
lawyer, Mr Gromwell, whose really beautiful floral name suited somehow his
innocent eyes and fair beard... (2.2)
The Russian name of "gromwell" (Lithospermum gen.)
is vorobeykink. Like Vorob'yaninov (the name of Ostap
Bender's partner), vorobeynik comes from vorobey
(sparrow). Btw., the name of Vorob'yaninov's mother-in-law, Mme Petukhov,
comes from petukh (cock). Vorobeynik rhymes with
korobeynik (obs., pedlar). "Pedlar" rhymes with "medlar".
Mispel is German for "medlar": Van toyed with the
idea of challenging Mr Medlar (who, he hoped, would choose
swords) to a duel at dawn in a secluded corner of the Park whose central green
he could see from the penthouse terrace where he fenced with a French coach
twice a week, the only exercise, save riding, that he still indulged in; but to
his surprise - and relief (for he was a little ashamed to defend his 'novelette'
and only wished to forget it, just as another, unrelated, Veen might have
denounced - if allowed a longer life - his pubescent dream of ideal bordels) Max
Mushmula (Russian for 'medlar') answered Van's tentative cartel
with the warm-hearted promise of sending him his next article, 'The Weed Exiles
the Flower' (Melville & Marvell). Korobeyniki (Pedlars, 1861) is a celebrated poem by
Nekrasov. Gromwell rhymes with Cromwell.
In Van's novel a pretty girl named Theresa sends messages
from Terra to an Antiterran Professor. Tereza is a character in
Dostoevski's first novel Bednye lyudi (Poor Folk, 1846) written in
the epistolary form. It is Tereza, an old servant woman at the Furnished
Rooms where Makar Devushkin lives, who brings Makar's letters to Varen'ka
Dobrosyolov (who lives in the same appartment house, across the
courtyard) and Varen'ka's letters to Makar.***
Father Fyodor's letters to his wife in "The 12 Chairs" are a
parody of Dostoevski's letters (signed tvoy vechno muzh
Fedya****) to his wife Anna Grigorievna.
*Alfavit (alphabet) = Flavita (Russian Scrabble,
1.36)
**Tikhon = Khotin = khiton (tunic)
***Makar = karma = marka = ramka = amkar...
****your husband eternally, Theo
Alexey Sklyarenko