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Fw: A modest proposal from Michael Maar
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EDNOTE. NABOKV-L takes pleasure in presenting this note from Dr. Michael
Maar, the literary scholar whose article on the von Lichberg story "Lolita"
as a predecessor of Nabokov's novel has given rise to a media brouhaha about
plagarism. As Dr. Maar remarks below this was not his assertion, nor his
intent. Substantive comments are welcome.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Michael Maar" <michael.maar@snafu.de>
To: <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
Sent: Monday, April 05, 2004 10:10 AM
Subject: A modest proposal
Dear list,
It is an ironic situation. Since my doctoral work on Thomas Mann and Hans
Christian Andersen (1995), forms and patterns of intertextuality have been,
if I may say so, my daily bread. But whether the cases in point were
Richard Wagner and Heinrich von Kleist, Anthony Powell and Proust, Nabokov
and Keats or Schopenhauer, or Joanne K. Rowling and Nabokov, not once did
even a shadow of the silly and illiterate concept of ‘plagiarism’ appear in
my writing. Never I have written anything that could give rise to such a
charge against, of all people, Vladimir Nabokov, the very word being absurd
in connexion with him. On the contrary, while leaving all other hypotheses
for the parallels between Heinz von Lichberg's “Lolita” and Nabokov's novel
open for evaluation, this was the
only one I strictly and repeatedly excluded. Headlines and international
press agencies have distorted and sensationalized my essay, but this is a
fact I am not responsible for. Readers of my full text in the TLS can judge
for themselves if there is anything disparaging of Nabokov in it. I look
forward to scholarly discussion, without tilting at windmills, of my
argument for resemblances between the two Lolitas, and of the range of
possible explanations for them, and hope that the list will be one of its
arenas.
>
>
> With best wishes
> Michael Maar
>
>
Maar, the literary scholar whose article on the von Lichberg story "Lolita"
as a predecessor of Nabokov's novel has given rise to a media brouhaha about
plagarism. As Dr. Maar remarks below this was not his assertion, nor his
intent. Substantive comments are welcome.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Michael Maar" <michael.maar@snafu.de>
To: <NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>
Sent: Monday, April 05, 2004 10:10 AM
Subject: A modest proposal
Dear list,
It is an ironic situation. Since my doctoral work on Thomas Mann and Hans
Christian Andersen (1995), forms and patterns of intertextuality have been,
if I may say so, my daily bread. But whether the cases in point were
Richard Wagner and Heinrich von Kleist, Anthony Powell and Proust, Nabokov
and Keats or Schopenhauer, or Joanne K. Rowling and Nabokov, not once did
even a shadow of the silly and illiterate concept of ‘plagiarism’ appear in
my writing. Never I have written anything that could give rise to such a
charge against, of all people, Vladimir Nabokov, the very word being absurd
in connexion with him. On the contrary, while leaving all other hypotheses
for the parallels between Heinz von Lichberg's “Lolita” and Nabokov's novel
open for evaluation, this was the
only one I strictly and repeatedly excluded. Headlines and international
press agencies have distorted and sensationalized my essay, but this is a
fact I am not responsible for. Readers of my full text in the TLS can judge
for themselves if there is anything disparaging of Nabokov in it. I look
forward to scholarly discussion, without tilting at windmills, of my
argument for resemblances between the two Lolitas, and of the range of
possible explanations for them, and hope that the list will be one of its
arenas.
>
>
> With best wishes
> Michael Maar
>
>