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Re: Nabokov's Dismissals
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WD: one recalls the trad. Christian injunction ³Hate the SIN, but love the
SINNER.²
Art-gossip oft suggests variants such as ³A curse on ye BOTH -- maker and
product.²
An extreme counterexample which I (together with the Bernards Shaw and
Levin!) have learned to live with is the antisemitic prose of my (our)
favourite composer, Wagner. Yet I share VN¹s revulsion at the Very Rev
Eliot¹s unpardonable ³Sweeney Among the Nightingales² [Rachel nee
Rabinovitch/Tears at the grapes with murderous paws¹ tears at my heart with
CUSC memories of the soft touch of an Ethel nee Rabinovitch mind your own
business ...]
I suppose our relative ³Titan-ranking² of Wagner, VN, Eliot et al (DN¹s
pantheon¹ is presumably multi-tiered like Dante¹s ten-heaven¹d Paradiso?)
conditions us into forgiving or not forgiving particular ³lapses² or
³character defects.² Crudely: the opening chords of Tristan trump Richard¹s
maddening egomania? Or taking, almost at random, from KQK:
³What guarantee do you offer me?² asked Dreyer, relishing the entertainment.
³The guarantee of the human spirit,² the inventor said trenchantly.
One could play this card¹ to defend any number of VN¹s curt dismissals?
The equivalent in Scouse folklore: ³What would you do if you found Nabokov
in bed with your wife?² ³I¹¹ld slip out quietly and bring them a nice cuppa
tea.²
In supporting VN¹s anti-authoritarianism, we must naturally ponder,
individually, his own _ex cathedra_ verdicts.
We skipped the Japan/Croatia WorldCup match to attend the Globe Theatre¹s
production of Coriolanus. Shakespeare: What an over-rated upstart shakescene
sod of a crow! Greene and Voltaire were right!
Stan Kelly-Bootle
On 27/6/06 21:33, "William Dane" <wdane30@HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:
>
> In Lectures on Russian Lit, VN apparently says:
>
> Let me refer to one more method of dealing with literature---and this is the
> simplest and perhaps the most important one. If you hate a book, you still may
> derive artistic delight from imagining other and better ways of looking at
> things, or, what is the same, expressing things, than the author you hate
> does.
>
> I came across the quote in Omry Ronen's "Emulation, Anti-Parody,
> Intertextuality, and Annotation," Nabokov Studies 98/99.
>
> It would explain in part why VN bothered to read works that he hated.
>
> wd
>
>
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SINNER.²
Art-gossip oft suggests variants such as ³A curse on ye BOTH -- maker and
product.²
An extreme counterexample which I (together with the Bernards Shaw and
Levin!) have learned to live with is the antisemitic prose of my (our)
favourite composer, Wagner. Yet I share VN¹s revulsion at the Very Rev
Eliot¹s unpardonable ³Sweeney Among the Nightingales² [Rachel nee
Rabinovitch/Tears at the grapes with murderous paws¹ tears at my heart with
CUSC memories of the soft touch of an Ethel nee Rabinovitch mind your own
business ...]
I suppose our relative ³Titan-ranking² of Wagner, VN, Eliot et al (DN¹s
pantheon¹ is presumably multi-tiered like Dante¹s ten-heaven¹d Paradiso?)
conditions us into forgiving or not forgiving particular ³lapses² or
³character defects.² Crudely: the opening chords of Tristan trump Richard¹s
maddening egomania? Or taking, almost at random, from KQK:
³What guarantee do you offer me?² asked Dreyer, relishing the entertainment.
³The guarantee of the human spirit,² the inventor said trenchantly.
One could play this card¹ to defend any number of VN¹s curt dismissals?
The equivalent in Scouse folklore: ³What would you do if you found Nabokov
in bed with your wife?² ³I¹¹ld slip out quietly and bring them a nice cuppa
tea.²
In supporting VN¹s anti-authoritarianism, we must naturally ponder,
individually, his own _ex cathedra_ verdicts.
We skipped the Japan/Croatia WorldCup match to attend the Globe Theatre¹s
production of Coriolanus. Shakespeare: What an over-rated upstart shakescene
sod of a crow! Greene and Voltaire were right!
Stan Kelly-Bootle
On 27/6/06 21:33, "William Dane" <wdane30@HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:
>
> In Lectures on Russian Lit, VN apparently says:
>
> Let me refer to one more method of dealing with literature---and this is the
> simplest and perhaps the most important one. If you hate a book, you still may
> derive artistic delight from imagining other and better ways of looking at
> things, or, what is the same, expressing things, than the author you hate
> does.
>
> I came across the quote in Omry Ronen's "Emulation, Anti-Parody,
> Intertextuality, and Annotation," Nabokov Studies 98/99.
>
> It would explain in part why VN bothered to read works that he hated.
>
> wd
>
>
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