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AM, PM; amor; Freud
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----- Original Message -----
From: Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello
To: D. Barton Johnson
Sent: Sunday, September 28, 2003 10:17 AM
Subject: Re: hello
EDNOTE. Apart from the natutural history and sexual terms the Spanish words are lifted from poems by VN's poet-colleague Jorge Guillen.
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Carolyn thinks that I seem to be the first to find love in the (morning or ) afternoon! ( the reference to am or pm...).
I´d been commenting with her the rhyme of the Spanish words that could come up in the conversation with the Andalusian architect : canastilla, nublarrones, mariposa, paloma, grevol, aroma, hombre ... cojones...
We may also find, beside the sound suggestion to confirm the ending "ones" in the image of the hanging "j" between the two "o" , the insistence in the word "amor" ( aroma, mariposa ).
When in the beginning VN is telling Aqua´s story there is a wordplay with Dr.Sig Heiler and soon after comes a Dr.Fig ("spanker of girl bottoms") . Soon before he had a Dr.Froid and soon after we have a variation on Lincoln and the Ladybird episode, plus a story about Les Malheurs de Swann ( a reference to Ségur´s book "Les Malheurs de Sophie" ) to introduce the Catleya theme ( the word Proust used for copulation, as you know ). This is why I´d thought VN might be indirectly hinting at his having read " A Child is being beaten"..
'
Best ( I´m in a hurry, Sunday Lunch time now here... )
Jansy
----- Original Message -----
From: D. Barton Johnson
To: Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello
Sent: Sunday, September 28, 2003 1:04 PM
Subject: Re: hello
Dear Jansy,
Freud prbably had Harriet Beecher Stowe's UNCLE TOM's CABIN in mind. The Comtesse cames up because I vaguely wondered if ADA's Burning B had links to it since VN uses allusion to it in SpM. The Lincoln was a red herring. Best, Don
----- Original Message -----
From: Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello
To: D. Barton Johnson
Sent: Friday, September 26, 2003 8:56 PM
Subject: hello
Hi, Don
thank you for your message sent privately.
Today´s discussion on the theme of lemniscates, Bernouilli, bicycles and Sherlock Homes was lovely to read, fascinating ! Congratulations for this rich gleaning process your are coordinating.
Here is another quick superficial observation that, due to its superficiality ( I´m not checking books, names, references or even the List ) I´d rather not have mentioned to the Nabokov-L:
In the same 1919 text where Freud is dealing with different sexual fantasies in boys and girls, and in which he mentions the Comtesse de Ségur, he also makes reference to slavery and the book "Father Thomas´ Cabin" ( I don´t know if the original title is like that ).
I seem to remember you had approached Ségur and Abe Lincoln ( slavery ) somewhere in one of the messages...I may be wrong, but decided to bring this up to your attention anyway.
Jansy