Subject
PF Timeline and some details
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Sergei Soloviev wrote: "I've been looking Jerry Friedman's timeline for
PF and it reminded me two questions I would like to ask:..." I also
followed Don B. Johnson's advice and have other questions or
observations to add to S. Soloviev's:
JF wrote: "April 6 - Kinbote receives a letter from Disa containing
Shade's "The Sacred Tree" (n. 49). Is this too fast to be an answer to
his letter?"
This is one of the "discrepancies" that made me think that CK went back
and forwards in his notes, inserting observations that apparently
disobeyed the chronology ( there is a very complete posting today
dealing with this matter written by Mary Bellino).
In the case of Disa's letter, there is the added possibility that
Nabokov had been playing with E.A.Poe's "The Purloined Letter".
Shade's poem "The Sacred Tree" reminded me that the word for tree in
Zemblan is "Gradus".
Before I read JF's "Timeline to PF" I had not realized the strange order
of names and birthdates of the Goldsworth daughters. The name of the
oldest one begins with D, then we have C, B and, the yougest, A. It
looks as if the Goldsworth's practiced birthcontrol to plan for only
four babies.
JF wrote:
1. July 11 (1959) Shade finishes Canto 2 (FW).
" Kinbote prowls around the Shades' house, sees them crying, and bangs
a garbage can but (believes he) isn't discovered (n. 47-49)."
2. And yet he also observed that, before that, in March (1958)
"The Shades hear noises, play chess. (ll. 653-664). This may be the
previous March; Shade seems to telescope the time between Hazel's death
and the incidents of 1959."
I had always interpreted the noises ( with their dire references to
Goethe,Webster and TSEliot) as stemming from Kinbote all the time ( but
Kinbote mentions a dog that disturbs his neighbor's garbage cans and the
dog might have been doing that even before he came to New Wye). After
JF's careful notation, I think various distinct "noises" were added to
Shade's poem, not only those suggesting a spying Kinbote...
Jansy
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PF and it reminded me two questions I would like to ask:..." I also
followed Don B. Johnson's advice and have other questions or
observations to add to S. Soloviev's:
JF wrote: "April 6 - Kinbote receives a letter from Disa containing
Shade's "The Sacred Tree" (n. 49). Is this too fast to be an answer to
his letter?"
This is one of the "discrepancies" that made me think that CK went back
and forwards in his notes, inserting observations that apparently
disobeyed the chronology ( there is a very complete posting today
dealing with this matter written by Mary Bellino).
In the case of Disa's letter, there is the added possibility that
Nabokov had been playing with E.A.Poe's "The Purloined Letter".
Shade's poem "The Sacred Tree" reminded me that the word for tree in
Zemblan is "Gradus".
Before I read JF's "Timeline to PF" I had not realized the strange order
of names and birthdates of the Goldsworth daughters. The name of the
oldest one begins with D, then we have C, B and, the yougest, A. It
looks as if the Goldsworth's practiced birthcontrol to plan for only
four babies.
JF wrote:
1. July 11 (1959) Shade finishes Canto 2 (FW).
" Kinbote prowls around the Shades' house, sees them crying, and bangs
a garbage can but (believes he) isn't discovered (n. 47-49)."
2. And yet he also observed that, before that, in March (1958)
"The Shades hear noises, play chess. (ll. 653-664). This may be the
previous March; Shade seems to telescope the time between Hazel's death
and the incidents of 1959."
I had always interpreted the noises ( with their dire references to
Goethe,Webster and TSEliot) as stemming from Kinbote all the time ( but
Kinbote mentions a dog that disturbs his neighbor's garbage cans and the
dog might have been doing that even before he came to New Wye). After
JF's careful notation, I think various distinct "noises" were added to
Shade's poem, not only those suggesting a spying Kinbote...
Jansy
Search the archive: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/archives/nabokv-l.html
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