Subject
Paris VN Conference. Nov. 1999: Averin abstract
Date
Body
Boris Averin
"The Motif of Memory in Nabokov and Russian Religious Philosophy"
The motif of memory so dear to N is most often considered as
nostalgic. Our paper contests this interpretation.
There are two opposing views of memories. One goes back to Plato,
Epicurus, and Plotinus; it regards memory as a voluntary act. The other
identifies it with passive and involuntary absorption of the past. It is
from the latter view that one affirms the interpretation of memory as
"complice nostalgique.
It is important to note that in the framework of Russian culture
of the first half of the XIXth century, memory is understood in a
completely different way.
After having posed the problem of the polyvalence of the human
personality (a social, biological, and psychic ego belonging to the
present
and the past), the thinkers of this epoch returned to a search for
unity. According to Russian philosophers, this new synthesis could be
realized by means of an active and creative memory which leads
to "ressemblement"; to both the revival of the personality (N. Karsavin),
to knowledge of the self (Beryaev), and hence to the reunification of
isolated aspects of human individuality (Gurdjieff, Uspenskii).
It is in this cultural and metaphysical context that one must inscribe
the motif of memory as the resurrection of the personality. This idea,
becoming ever more complex, dominates all of Nabokov's work.
"The Motif of Memory in Nabokov and Russian Religious Philosophy"
The motif of memory so dear to N is most often considered as
nostalgic. Our paper contests this interpretation.
There are two opposing views of memories. One goes back to Plato,
Epicurus, and Plotinus; it regards memory as a voluntary act. The other
identifies it with passive and involuntary absorption of the past. It is
from the latter view that one affirms the interpretation of memory as
"complice nostalgique.
It is important to note that in the framework of Russian culture
of the first half of the XIXth century, memory is understood in a
completely different way.
After having posed the problem of the polyvalence of the human
personality (a social, biological, and psychic ego belonging to the
present
and the past), the thinkers of this epoch returned to a search for
unity. According to Russian philosophers, this new synthesis could be
realized by means of an active and creative memory which leads
to "ressemblement"; to both the revival of the personality (N. Karsavin),
to knowledge of the self (Beryaev), and hence to the reunification of
isolated aspects of human individuality (Gurdjieff, Uspenskii).
It is in this cultural and metaphysical context that one must inscribe
the motif of memory as the resurrection of the personality. This idea,
becoming ever more complex, dominates all of Nabokov's work.