COROSO* + SIRIN = CORSO ORSINI (a street at Gandora, in the
Tessin, that Vadim crosses a few moments before he gets
paralized).
In Kuzmin's Kryl'ya (The Wings, 1908)
the Roman street Corso is mentioned. The novella's characters include the
musical critic Orsini and Vanya Smurov, a youth whose name brings to mind
Smurov, the narrator and main character in The Eye, and Vanya
(Varvara's strange diminutive), the girl with whom Smurov is in love. According
to Roman Bogdanovich (a character in The Eye), Smurov is "a sexual
lefty." Kuzmin (1875-1936), a poet, prose writer and composer was
openly gay. Several characters in LATH (including, perhaps, Iris's brother Ivor
Black) are "sexual lefties."
KALIOSTRO + LESKOV = KALI + OSTROV + LESKO
Kaliostro - Cagliostro in Russian spelling. Kuzmin is the author of The
Marvelous Life of Giuseppe Balsamo, Count Cagliostro (1916).
Kali - the Hindu goddess of death
ostrov - Russ., island
Lesko - Lescaut in Russian spelling. One of Kuzmin's best poems
is Nadpis' na knige (Inscription on a Book, 1909),
with the dedication to Gumilyov. The book in this charming rondeau is
Manon Lescaut (L'Abbé Prévost's L'Histoire du chevalier
des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut, 1731).
*an invented word, khorosho (Russ., good) pronounced with Chinese
or Japanese accent ("Vladim Vladimych" Mayakovski is the author of
Khorosho, 1927. One of Kuzmin's odes is dedicated to Mayakovski)
Alexey Sklyarenko