Subject
M. Verdoux et M. Humbert (fwd)
Date
Body
The ever observant Michael Wood notes (in THE NEW YORK REVIEW OF
BOOKS, July 17) an interesting antecedent to a familiar passage, that
is, one which "anticipates Humbert Humbert's scheme for murdering
Charlotte Haze in LOLITA. Verdoux takes one of his wives out in a
boat on a lake, and is ready to strangle her with a noose, when he
realizes they are being watched from the shore. He realizes this
because the watcher is yodeling. And is quickly joined by other
yodelers, a whole chorus. This is funny, I think, because it does
something Chaplin so often does [...]. It introduces the ridiculous
into a territory we thought was safe from it; and it reminds us that
the ridiculous is weirdly neutral, evenhanded, in relation to danger
and power. You could be killed by a clown or saved by a yodeler."
The differnces, it seems to me, are as interesting as the
similarities. Consider, also, this sentence, as a comment on the
uneasy laughter Nabokov, no less than Chaplin, provokes: "You don't
need a justification for anything that's funny, and anything, even
murder, can be funny."
Wayne Daniels
Metro Toronto Reference Library
wdaniels@gwmail.mtrl.toronto.on.ca
______________________________________________________________
EDITOR's NOTE. ANd then there is Dreiser's AMERICAN TRAGEDY that VN uses
in KQKn, (See Boyd's BIBLION article.)
BOOKS, July 17) an interesting antecedent to a familiar passage, that
is, one which "anticipates Humbert Humbert's scheme for murdering
Charlotte Haze in LOLITA. Verdoux takes one of his wives out in a
boat on a lake, and is ready to strangle her with a noose, when he
realizes they are being watched from the shore. He realizes this
because the watcher is yodeling. And is quickly joined by other
yodelers, a whole chorus. This is funny, I think, because it does
something Chaplin so often does [...]. It introduces the ridiculous
into a territory we thought was safe from it; and it reminds us that
the ridiculous is weirdly neutral, evenhanded, in relation to danger
and power. You could be killed by a clown or saved by a yodeler."
The differnces, it seems to me, are as interesting as the
similarities. Consider, also, this sentence, as a comment on the
uneasy laughter Nabokov, no less than Chaplin, provokes: "You don't
need a justification for anything that's funny, and anything, even
murder, can be funny."
Wayne Daniels
Metro Toronto Reference Library
wdaniels@gwmail.mtrl.toronto.on.ca
______________________________________________________________
EDITOR's NOTE. ANd then there is Dreiser's AMERICAN TRAGEDY that VN uses
in KQKn, (See Boyd's BIBLION article.)