A.Sklyarenko: “Marina gave birth to Van in Dr Lapiner's alpine chalet on January 1, 1870 [ ]”, before adding various quotes such as “in a mountain refuge on Sex Rouge, where a Dr Alpiner, general practitioner and gentian-lover, sat providentially waiting near a rude red stove for his boots to dry. (1.3)”
Jansy Mello: I could not avoid being struck anew by VN’s word plays, particularly in association to procreation (gentiarium-genitarium or the uterine warm “stoves”), to the fertile rabbits (lapin) and, for whatever reason, the Alps: Lapiner, alpine, Alp.*
AS notes the words related to “Neva”:
“Nevada (Ada's rhyme-name town where she gamed with Demon, 2.1) and Geneva (the city where Norbert von Miller was a Russian translator at the Italian Consulate) both have Neva ("the legendary river of Old Rus," 2.1) in them. Pushkin's Onegin was born upon the Neva's banks (Eugene Onegin: One: II: 10)”
and for the first time I recognized a faint echo that the word “snow” in Portuguese (“neve”)that adds to the general atmosphere of crystal snowflakes. I wonder if VN was aware of this white link since Neve comes from the Latin, Nix, nivis and, although “nivis” is related to “Nevada,” I doubt it that there’s an etymological link to the river Neva.
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*- The English word Alps derives from the Latin Alpes [ ] According to the Old English Dictionary, the Latin Alpes might possibly derive from a pre-Indo-European word *alb "hill"; It's likely that alb ("white") and albus have common origins deriving from the association of the tops of tall mountains or steep hills with snow.
The name "Nevada" comes from the Spanish nevada, meaning "snow-covered",[15] after the Sierra Nevada ("snow-covered mountain range”)
(both entries were extracted from the wikipedia)