Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

In his commentary to Shade's poem Kinbote (in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, Shade’s mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla) calls Professor Pnin, the Head of the bloated Russian Department at Wordsmith University, "a regular martinet in regard to his underlings," and "that grotesque perfectionist:"

Describing a conversation at the Faculty Club, Kinbote (in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, Shade’s mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla) compares Gerald Emerald (a young instructor at Wordsmith University who gives Gradus, Shade's murderer, a lift to Kinbote's rented house in New Wye) to a disciple in Leonardo's Last Supper:

In June 1947 thirty-seven-year-old Humbert Humbert (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Lolita, 1955) meets and falls in love with twelve-year-old Dolores Haze (Lolita's full name) in Ramsdale, a town in New England. Ramsdale seems to combine Ramsgate (a sea-side town and civil parish in east Kent, England) with Deal (another coastal town in Kent; close to Deal is Walmer, a possible location for Julius Caesar's first arrival in Britain, Aug. 26, 55 BC).

According to Kinbote (in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, Shade’s mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla), in a conversation with him and Shade Mrs. Hurley mentioned the old man at the Exton railway station who thought he was God and began redirecting the trains:

Above this the poet wrote and struck out:

The madman’s fate

In Canto Two of his poem John Shade (the poet in VN's novel Pale Fire, 1962) speaks of afterlife and mentions the Turk's delight: 

So why join in the vulgar laughter? Why

Scorn a hereafter none can verify:

The Turk's delight, the future lyres, the talks

With Socrates and Proust in cypress walks,

The seraph with his six flamingo wings,

And Flemish hells with porcupines and things?

It isn't that we dream too wild a dream:

The trouble is we do not make it seem

Sufficiently unlikely; for the most

According to Kinbote (in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, Shade’s mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla), he once told Shade "people who live in glass houses should not write poems:"

Describing Gradus’ trip from the Wordsmith University Library to Judge Goldsworth’s house in New Wye, Kinbote (in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, Shade's mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla) mentions the trilby that he hopes was forgotten by Gradus in Gerald Emerald’s car:

Gradus returned to the Main Desk.

"Too bad," said the girl, "I just saw him leave."

According to Kinbote (in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, Shade’s mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla), he was introduced to Shade on Monday, February 16, 1959:

According to Kinbote (in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, Shade’s mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla), the maiden name of Shade’s mother was Caroline Lukin:

In VN's novel Pnin (1957) the narrator several times mentions Frieze Hall at Waindell College: