Subject
Fw: Rereading Nabokov
From
Date
Body
----- Original Message -----
From: Cotugno, Marianne
To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2004 9:00 AM
Subject: Rereading Nabokov
Was just having this discussion with a friend about the various responses one can have when rereading a text (he told me the same thing happens when he reads Joyce's Portrait). I'm rereading Lolita for my class and absolutely LOVING this novel - noticing all sorts of little details I've missed (or forgotten) in past readings. This wasn't the case last year when I read it; I felt a bit bored by everything.
This makes me wonder WHY I have these varying responses to a novel that I fundamentally do appreciate. I haven't reread The Real Life of Sebastian Knight recently, which was always a favorite of mine as an undergrad and grad, but I wonder if I'd like that less.
Does anyone else have a comparable "love-hate" relationship with a Nabokov novel? If so, has anyone given much thought or whitespace to thinking or writing about this?
I do think my excitement about the novel is in part due to reading it alongside Reading Lolita in Tehran, which has reinvigorated my sense of the novel especially at the school where I teach.
MC