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Burning Barn in ADA
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In my Russian article on the Burning Barn scene in Ada (http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/sklyarenko6.doc) and elsewhere I argue that Ada, who wanted to spend the night with Van and needed the house to be empty, bribed somebody in the Ardis household (presumably, Kim Beauharnais, the kitchen boy and photographer) to set the barn on fire. This is an old trick. Shkurin, the valet of Ekaterina Alekseevna (the future Empress Catherine II), set his own house on fire in the night when Ekaterina gave birth to Aleksey Bobrinsky, her son by Grigoriy Orlov. Shkurin knew that the Emperor Peter III (Ekaterina's husband who was murdered by Aleksey Orlov, Grigoriy's brother, a couple of months later) greatly enjoyed fires and that to admire one he would go to a distant part of the city. Ivanchuk, a character in Aldanov's novel "Чёртов мост" (Le Pont du Diable, 1925), tells the whole story to Shtaal, the novel's hero.
The name Shkurin comes from shkura, "animal's skin" (see anagram with shkura in one of my previous posts). As to the name Bobrinsky (that comes from Bobriki, the estate Catherine gave her illegitimate son), it reminds one of Marina's and Ada's bobry (the sea-otter fur coats). Catherine didn't love her son who was brought up in Shkurin's family. In Ada, Marina abandons her son Van to her twin sister Aqua.
Other famous arsonists include Herostratus, Nero and Count Rostopchin.
Alexey Sklyarenko
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The name Shkurin comes from shkura, "animal's skin" (see anagram with shkura in one of my previous posts). As to the name Bobrinsky (that comes from Bobriki, the estate Catherine gave her illegitimate son), it reminds one of Marina's and Ada's bobry (the sea-otter fur coats). Catherine didn't love her son who was brought up in Shkurin's family. In Ada, Marina abandons her son Van to her twin sister Aqua.
Other famous arsonists include Herostratus, Nero and Count Rostopchin.
Alexey Sklyarenko
Search archive with Google:
http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=site:listserv.ucsb.edu&HL=en
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Visit "Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
Manage subscription options: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/