Subject
Sotheby sale of VN _Camera obscura_
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Date
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James Campbell's NB column in the (London) Times Literary Supplement
(June 21, 2002; p. 18) contains a curious item. On July 12, Sotheby's is
auctioning a copy of Vladimir Nabokov-Sirin's _Camera obscura_,
published by Long in 1936. It is the Winifred Roy translation. The
volume itself is very rare and there are reportedly only three with the
original paper jacket. Juliar has a photo of the cover but the TLS note
displays a color photo of the book with its rather tattered jacket.
The story (or the Sotheby catalogue description) mistakenly asserts
that the edition is a translation of the Russian _Smeh v Temnote_
better known in English as _Laughter in the Dark_. Most curious, since
the first and only title of the original version of the novel is (in
translated Cyrillic) _ Kamera obskura_. VN later extensively revised the
book and did an English edition (1938) with the title _Laughter in the
Dark_. The Russian _Smeh v Temnote_ version is a very recent
development. When Symposium publishers in St. Petersburg issued their
handsomely annotated ten-volume VN centennial edition, they included not
only VN's original Russian version (1932) but a "back" translation of
the revised 1938 English _Laughter in the Dark__, entitled _Smeh v
Temnote_. Before this there never was a VN Russian work entitled _Smeh (
better "Smex" or Smekh) v Temnote."
More happily, the article remarks that Winifred Roy translated __Camera
obscura_ from the FRENCH version (_Chambre obscure_ done by Doussia
Ergaz [1934]), and NOT the Russian as had been assumed -- a fact I
pointed out some time ago.
D. Barton Johnson
Winifred
(June 21, 2002; p. 18) contains a curious item. On July 12, Sotheby's is
auctioning a copy of Vladimir Nabokov-Sirin's _Camera obscura_,
published by Long in 1936. It is the Winifred Roy translation. The
volume itself is very rare and there are reportedly only three with the
original paper jacket. Juliar has a photo of the cover but the TLS note
displays a color photo of the book with its rather tattered jacket.
The story (or the Sotheby catalogue description) mistakenly asserts
that the edition is a translation of the Russian _Smeh v Temnote_
better known in English as _Laughter in the Dark_. Most curious, since
the first and only title of the original version of the novel is (in
translated Cyrillic) _ Kamera obskura_. VN later extensively revised the
book and did an English edition (1938) with the title _Laughter in the
Dark_. The Russian _Smeh v Temnote_ version is a very recent
development. When Symposium publishers in St. Petersburg issued their
handsomely annotated ten-volume VN centennial edition, they included not
only VN's original Russian version (1932) but a "back" translation of
the revised 1938 English _Laughter in the Dark__, entitled _Smeh v
Temnote_. Before this there never was a VN Russian work entitled _Smeh (
better "Smex" or Smekh) v Temnote."
More happily, the article remarks that Winifred Roy translated __Camera
obscura_ from the FRENCH version (_Chambre obscure_ done by Doussia
Ergaz [1934]), and NOT the Russian as had been assumed -- a fact I
pointed out some time ago.
D. Barton Johnson
Winifred