Vladimir Nabokov

NABOKV-L post 0004569, Mon, 15 Nov 1999 11:31:52 -0800

Subject
Re: "Ada" to be made into a film (fwd)
Date
Body
----

>THE SUNDAY TIMES
>November 14 1999 NEWS REVIEW
>
>The key to the Nabokov cabinet
>

>A few films cry out to be made. Others should never have been essayed and
>ought to be put out of their misery. A plangent instance of the second is The
>Blair Witch Project...

This reviewer obviously was born to put the undeserving out of their misery.

>...Nabokov, the Russian aristocrat who went to Cambridge, lived
>between the wars in Berlin, where his early novels were published, then moved
>to Paris, where he met James Joyce, and finally emigrated to America where he
>held the chair of Russian literature at Cornell University.

Is this Nabokov, or some other rarefied article?

The succËs du
>scandale of his novel Lolita allowed him to devote himself entirely to
>writing and consolidate his reputation as one of the most glittering
>intellects of the century. He's always seemed to me one of the three great
>writers of English born speaking another tongue; the others are Conrad and
>Koestler.

Isn't this rich?

>A number of top international scriptwriters were commissioned to do a film
>script for Ada (rhyme it with ardour);

or larder

>...His
>solution appealed to Nabokov, who gave him the screen rights.

GAVE him?

>....And what
>precisely is the book's fascination? "It's a sort of enchantment," Michael
>says. "It has a good story line and is quite erotic. I see it as not so much
>an art movie as a good seller."

But not quite up to say, Harriet Marwood, Governess

Though this is undoubtedly good judgment. Imagine if an art movie had been
essayed.

>...."When I
>left Nabokov," says Michael, "my last words to him were per Ada ad astra."
>The old word juggler enjoyed that...

Yes, but what were HIS last words?