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Re: [NABOKOV-L] Pompons and pumpkins
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Thanks, Anthony: I never tire of re-reading and re-relishing VN¹s blast
against William Woodin Rowe¹s Nabokov¹s Deceptive World (NYU Press, 1971)
See http://lib.ru/NABOKOW/Rowe.txt
A tad unfair of me since I¹ve not read any of Rowe¹s books, and Time¹s
flapping wings seem to preclude that dubious, future pleasure.
How could Rowe (pronounced as in argument or as in regatta?) survive such
deflation? Or did he? We know poor Bunny Wilson was never the same after
incurring VN¹s sarcasm. One of VN¹s legitimate hot-buttons was casting doubt
on his knowledge of the Russian language (Wilson) or manglng VN¹s Russian
words (Rowe). Another was making assumptions about VN¹s choice of words and
allusions (especially when nonesuch was intended!). These, alas, endure
alive¹n¹kicking beyond VN¹s vituperation.
I¹m not sure, Anthony, that the Greek etymology syn+ballein (to throw
together) really helps in clarifying exactly which meaning of SYMBOL VN
found abhorrent (see citation below). The Middle English, via Latin
symbolum, meaning Creed (as in Symbolum Nicaenum = Nicene Creed) has already
drifted away from the everyday, uncontroversial, mathematical usage: we use
SYMBOLS as convenient, short-hand marks for variables, constants, operators
etc., making sure that the reader is fully pre-informed of our intentions.
You write
What he (VN) detested was the prefabricated symbol as reductive, deadening
cliche, where A "really means", or "stands for" B, which "lies behind" A.
Now, VN was TOTALLY non-mathematical (choose your weapons!). In spite of
dropping the odd references to surds, relativity, symmetries, Zeno, the
ONLY-number-one, cycloids and infinity, he confused real mathematics with
dull, clerical arithmetic. This does not detract from VN the
scientist/philosopher (see S H Blackwell¹s The Quill and the Scalpel.) But,
even so, I doubt if VN could have mistaken algebraic symbols as reductive,
deadening clichés. Mathematical symbols are certainly prefabricated
(although arbitrarily chosen, they must be pre-defined) but when combined
they can produce equations surpassing Keatsian Beauty (with provable Truth
as an added bonus).
So what kind of symbols did VN detest? There are clues in the comments cited
by Anthony. It¹s what happens to many words when you add the sneering ISM,
-IST, -ISTICAL! Thus, Symbolism comes to mean the MISUSE of Symbols,
incurring VN¹s wrath:
What I object to is Mr. Rowe's manipulating my most innocent words
so as to introduce sexual "symbols" into them. The notion of
symbol itself has always been abhorrent to me, and I never tire
of retelling how I once failed a student-- the dupe, alas, of
an earlier teacher-- for writing that Jane Austen describes
leaves as "green" because Fanny is hopeful, and "green" is the
color of hope. The symbolism racket in schools attracts
computerized minds but destroys plain intelligence as well as
poetical sense. It bleaches the soul. It numbs all capacity to
enjoy the fun and enchantment of art. Who the hell cares, as
Mr. Rowe wants us to care, that there is, according to his
italics, a "man" in the sentence about a homosexual Swede who
"had embarrassing manners" (p. 148), and another "man"
in "manipulate" (passim)? "Wickedly folded moth"
suggests "wick" to Mr. Rowe, and "wick," as we Freudians know,
is the Male Organ. "I" stands for "eye," and "eye" stands for
the Female Organ. Pencil licking is always a reference to you
know what. A soccer goal hints at the vulval orifice (which Mr.
Rowe evidently sees as square).
Perhaps Jansy (are you safely back home?) can tell us if this excursion into
symbolism¹ helps her with Farmer¹s observations. It does seem a tortuous
road, littered with semantic land-mines: of course, both Lolita and HH are
fictional, so to distinguish between Lolita, the idealized nymphet lusted
after by HH, an imaginary paedo, and a real incarnation, Dolores, shagged
realistically from realistic school to realistic motel in a realistic
first-person, stretches our analysis of meta-symbolist-narrative beyond
usefulness. To cite our favourite author: It bleaches the soul. It numbs all
capacity to enjoy the fun and enchantment of art
Perhaps this warning applies only to Rowe¹s excessive hunt for Freudian
sexual symbols,¹ which certainly match Anthony¹s definition as the
prefabricated symbol as reductive, deadening cliche, where A "really means",
or "stands for" B, which "lies behind" A. This is the Symbolism (capital S)
related to Poetic Schools, where one object indirectly represents another
with much mystical hand-waving.
Stan Kelly-Bootle
PS: I did find a review of Rowe¹s book at http://www.jstor.org/pss/1207486
by Andrew Field (is that name allowed on the list? Perhaps I should write
A****w F***d to reduce the shock?) reminding us of VN¹s claimed indifference
to literary criticism, whether pro or con. (I recognize that pro and con
each have naughty meanings under Rowe¹s sym-bollick gaze.)
On 13/07/2010 20:02, "Anthony Stadlen" <STADLEN@AOL.COM> wrote:
> Perhaps start with Nabokov's fine short protest against "Rowe's Symbols" in
> Strong Opinions. He was a master of metaphor, of simile, and of symbolism in
> the authentic sense he expounds in "Rowe's Symbols" and in his Lectures on
> Literature. What he detested was the prefabricated symbol as reductive,
> deadening cliche, where A "really means", or "stands for" B, which "lies
> behind" A.¹
> Nabokov's "symbolism" is true to the original meaning of "sym-ballein".
>
> Anthony Stadlen
>
> In a message dated 13/07/2010 17:18:58 GMT Daylight Time, jansy@AETERN.US
> writes:
>>
>> Some time in April I started a message which was interrupted and misplaced
>> in my archives. It was related to a review sent to the Nab-List by someone
>> named Farmer (which I couldn't locate), dated from April 13,2010.
>>
>> I selected the following from it:
>>
>> Farmer notes that " 'Lolita' is the spiritual ideal of The Nymphet; Dolores
>> Haze is a temporary manifestation. To love the spiritual ideal through
>> Dolores's bodily reality, Humbert must discard Dolores as a real individual."
>>
>> I tried to compare Farmer's comment with another, from ADA, using Nabokov's
>> words: "the lewd, ludicrous and vulgar mistake of the Signy-Mondieu
>> analysts consists in their regarding a real object, a pompon, say, or a
>> pumpkin as a significant abstraction of the real object," but I got nowhere.
>>
>> Farmer's comment seems clear enough to me: the girl Dolores was an icon
>> through which Humbert could access the "spiritual ideal of the nymphet." A
>> living fetish.
>> Nabokov's, on the contrary, remains puzzling, also because VN often returned
>> to these two "real objects" (pompom, pumpkin) in various novels, in a
>> figurative sense (particularly in KQKn) like the red and white camelias in
>> the movie (perhaps also in Dumas' novel).
>> Could anyone help me to figure out what Nabokov intended as a criticism of
>> "Signy-Mondieu" (Freud, I presume)?
>>
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against William Woodin Rowe¹s Nabokov¹s Deceptive World (NYU Press, 1971)
See http://lib.ru/NABOKOW/Rowe.txt
A tad unfair of me since I¹ve not read any of Rowe¹s books, and Time¹s
flapping wings seem to preclude that dubious, future pleasure.
How could Rowe (pronounced as in argument or as in regatta?) survive such
deflation? Or did he? We know poor Bunny Wilson was never the same after
incurring VN¹s sarcasm. One of VN¹s legitimate hot-buttons was casting doubt
on his knowledge of the Russian language (Wilson) or manglng VN¹s Russian
words (Rowe). Another was making assumptions about VN¹s choice of words and
allusions (especially when nonesuch was intended!). These, alas, endure
alive¹n¹kicking beyond VN¹s vituperation.
I¹m not sure, Anthony, that the Greek etymology syn+ballein (to throw
together) really helps in clarifying exactly which meaning of SYMBOL VN
found abhorrent (see citation below). The Middle English, via Latin
symbolum, meaning Creed (as in Symbolum Nicaenum = Nicene Creed) has already
drifted away from the everyday, uncontroversial, mathematical usage: we use
SYMBOLS as convenient, short-hand marks for variables, constants, operators
etc., making sure that the reader is fully pre-informed of our intentions.
You write
What he (VN) detested was the prefabricated symbol as reductive, deadening
cliche, where A "really means", or "stands for" B, which "lies behind" A.
Now, VN was TOTALLY non-mathematical (choose your weapons!). In spite of
dropping the odd references to surds, relativity, symmetries, Zeno, the
ONLY-number-one, cycloids and infinity, he confused real mathematics with
dull, clerical arithmetic. This does not detract from VN the
scientist/philosopher (see S H Blackwell¹s The Quill and the Scalpel.) But,
even so, I doubt if VN could have mistaken algebraic symbols as reductive,
deadening clichés. Mathematical symbols are certainly prefabricated
(although arbitrarily chosen, they must be pre-defined) but when combined
they can produce equations surpassing Keatsian Beauty (with provable Truth
as an added bonus).
So what kind of symbols did VN detest? There are clues in the comments cited
by Anthony. It¹s what happens to many words when you add the sneering ISM,
-IST, -ISTICAL! Thus, Symbolism comes to mean the MISUSE of Symbols,
incurring VN¹s wrath:
What I object to is Mr. Rowe's manipulating my most innocent words
so as to introduce sexual "symbols" into them. The notion of
symbol itself has always been abhorrent to me, and I never tire
of retelling how I once failed a student-- the dupe, alas, of
an earlier teacher-- for writing that Jane Austen describes
leaves as "green" because Fanny is hopeful, and "green" is the
color of hope. The symbolism racket in schools attracts
computerized minds but destroys plain intelligence as well as
poetical sense. It bleaches the soul. It numbs all capacity to
enjoy the fun and enchantment of art. Who the hell cares, as
Mr. Rowe wants us to care, that there is, according to his
italics, a "man" in the sentence about a homosexual Swede who
"had embarrassing manners" (p. 148), and another "man"
in "manipulate" (passim)? "Wickedly folded moth"
suggests "wick" to Mr. Rowe, and "wick," as we Freudians know,
is the Male Organ. "I" stands for "eye," and "eye" stands for
the Female Organ. Pencil licking is always a reference to you
know what. A soccer goal hints at the vulval orifice (which Mr.
Rowe evidently sees as square).
Perhaps Jansy (are you safely back home?) can tell us if this excursion into
symbolism¹ helps her with Farmer¹s observations. It does seem a tortuous
road, littered with semantic land-mines: of course, both Lolita and HH are
fictional, so to distinguish between Lolita, the idealized nymphet lusted
after by HH, an imaginary paedo, and a real incarnation, Dolores, shagged
realistically from realistic school to realistic motel in a realistic
first-person, stretches our analysis of meta-symbolist-narrative beyond
usefulness. To cite our favourite author: It bleaches the soul. It numbs all
capacity to enjoy the fun and enchantment of art
Perhaps this warning applies only to Rowe¹s excessive hunt for Freudian
sexual symbols,¹ which certainly match Anthony¹s definition as the
prefabricated symbol as reductive, deadening cliche, where A "really means",
or "stands for" B, which "lies behind" A. This is the Symbolism (capital S)
related to Poetic Schools, where one object indirectly represents another
with much mystical hand-waving.
Stan Kelly-Bootle
PS: I did find a review of Rowe¹s book at http://www.jstor.org/pss/1207486
by Andrew Field (is that name allowed on the list? Perhaps I should write
A****w F***d to reduce the shock?) reminding us of VN¹s claimed indifference
to literary criticism, whether pro or con. (I recognize that pro and con
each have naughty meanings under Rowe¹s sym-bollick gaze.)
On 13/07/2010 20:02, "Anthony Stadlen" <STADLEN@AOL.COM> wrote:
> Perhaps start with Nabokov's fine short protest against "Rowe's Symbols" in
> Strong Opinions. He was a master of metaphor, of simile, and of symbolism in
> the authentic sense he expounds in "Rowe's Symbols" and in his Lectures on
> Literature. What he detested was the prefabricated symbol as reductive,
> deadening cliche, where A "really means", or "stands for" B, which "lies
> behind" A.¹
> Nabokov's "symbolism" is true to the original meaning of "sym-ballein".
>
> Anthony Stadlen
>
> In a message dated 13/07/2010 17:18:58 GMT Daylight Time, jansy@AETERN.US
> writes:
>>
>> Some time in April I started a message which was interrupted and misplaced
>> in my archives. It was related to a review sent to the Nab-List by someone
>> named Farmer (which I couldn't locate), dated from April 13,2010.
>>
>> I selected the following from it:
>>
>> Farmer notes that " 'Lolita' is the spiritual ideal of The Nymphet; Dolores
>> Haze is a temporary manifestation. To love the spiritual ideal through
>> Dolores's bodily reality, Humbert must discard Dolores as a real individual."
>>
>> I tried to compare Farmer's comment with another, from ADA, using Nabokov's
>> words: "the lewd, ludicrous and vulgar mistake of the Signy-Mondieu
>> analysts consists in their regarding a real object, a pompon, say, or a
>> pumpkin as a significant abstraction of the real object," but I got nowhere.
>>
>> Farmer's comment seems clear enough to me: the girl Dolores was an icon
>> through which Humbert could access the "spiritual ideal of the nymphet." A
>> living fetish.
>> Nabokov's, on the contrary, remains puzzling, also because VN often returned
>> to these two "real objects" (pompom, pumpkin) in various novels, in a
>> figurative sense (particularly in KQKn) like the red and white camelias in
>> the movie (perhaps also in Dumas' novel).
>> Could anyone help me to figure out what Nabokov intended as a criticism of
>> "Signy-Mondieu" (Freud, I presume)?
>>
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/