Subject
[NABOKOV-L] Marat and butterflies: garnering fluff and eating
pebbles...
pebbles...
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Date
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I was asked if Marat did, in fact, collect butterflies. My source about this item came from Nabokov, but he might have invented it...
(btw. Marat's name as a "scientist" is linked to combustion and the phlogiston, not to the word aether).
Excerpts from an exchange with Alvin Toffler, (Payboy -January, 1964) & gleaned from the internet.
AT: "Can you tell us something more about the actual creative process involved in the germination of a book-- perhaps by reading a few random notes for or excerpts from a work in progress?"
Nabokov: "Certainly not. No fetus should undergo an exploratory operation. But I can do something else. This box contains index
cards with some notes I made at various times more or less recently and discarded when writing Pale Fire. It's a little batch of rejects. Help yourself."
AT: "Selene, the moon..."Berry: the black knob on the bill of the mute swan" . . . "Naprapathy: the ugliest word in the language."...Snow
falling, young father out with tiny child, nose like a pink cherry..."Inter-columniation: dark-blue sky between two white columns." "Not I, too,
lived in Arcadia,' but 'I,' says Death, even am in Arcadia'-- Legend on a shepherd's tomb (Notes and Queries, June 13, 1868, p. 561)" . . . "Marat collected butterflies" . . . What inspires you to record and collect such disconnected impressions and quotations?
Nabokov: All I know is that at a very early stage of the novel's development I get this urge to garner bits of straw and fluff, and eat pebbles...
AT: In what sense do you copy "the conceived picture" of a novel?
Nabokov: A creative writer must study carefully the works of his rivals, including the Almighty. He must possess the inborn capacity not only of recombining but of re-creating the given world. In order to do this adequately, avoiding duplication of labor, the artist should know the given world.
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/
(btw. Marat's name as a "scientist" is linked to combustion and the phlogiston, not to the word aether).
Excerpts from an exchange with Alvin Toffler, (Payboy -January, 1964) & gleaned from the internet.
AT: "Can you tell us something more about the actual creative process involved in the germination of a book-- perhaps by reading a few random notes for or excerpts from a work in progress?"
Nabokov: "Certainly not. No fetus should undergo an exploratory operation. But I can do something else. This box contains index
cards with some notes I made at various times more or less recently and discarded when writing Pale Fire. It's a little batch of rejects. Help yourself."
AT: "Selene, the moon..."Berry: the black knob on the bill of the mute swan" . . . "Naprapathy: the ugliest word in the language."...Snow
falling, young father out with tiny child, nose like a pink cherry..."Inter-columniation: dark-blue sky between two white columns." "Not I, too,
lived in Arcadia,' but 'I,' says Death, even am in Arcadia'-- Legend on a shepherd's tomb (Notes and Queries, June 13, 1868, p. 561)" . . . "Marat collected butterflies" . . . What inspires you to record and collect such disconnected impressions and quotations?
Nabokov: All I know is that at a very early stage of the novel's development I get this urge to garner bits of straw and fluff, and eat pebbles...
AT: In what sense do you copy "the conceived picture" of a novel?
Nabokov: A creative writer must study carefully the works of his rivals, including the Almighty. He must possess the inborn capacity not only of recombining but of re-creating the given world. In order to do this adequately, avoiding duplication of labor, the artist should know the given world.
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/