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cybernab (fwd)
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EDITORIAL NOTE. The following collation by Suellen Stringer-Hye
<stringers@library.vanderbilt.edu> serves to update her "Nabokov in
Cyberspace," pp. 61-70 in the Fall 1995 (#35) of THE NABOKOVIAN. NABOKV-L
once again thanks Suellen Stringer-Hye for her contribution. She is also
the compiler of the CoLOllation pages -- a gathering of items about the
ever popular LOLITA -- on the Nabokov Web Site ZEMBLA.
Nabokov is a favorite on rec.arts books-- no doubt its participants
overlap with some of the members of this list. All newsgroups
like to compose lists, and rec.arts.books is no exception. To the
question: "What books did you get for Christmas?" many respondents
selected _Nabokov' s Short Stories_ as the cherished component of their
Christmas booty. One person received a first edition _Pale Fire_.
Nabokov also ranked high on the list of "Greatest Writers of the
20th Century". Below are excerpts from some of the discussions
surrounding his nomination.
newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Re: Greatest author of the 20th cent?
From: Sirin@ Date: 1995/12/21
I think for sheer consistency and inventiveness I might have
to go with Nabokov.
Finally, I applaud your nomination of Nabokov, who combined
the meticulousness and wordlove of a poet with the fancy of a
novelist.
I am so glad you know this. Nabokov is amazing.
Anyway, of what I've read so far, I like Invitation to a
Beheading best. |The way in which the warden worshipped the
other prisoner was fantastic. |And the idea of being punished
by society for not be transparent!
Yes Invitation to a Beheading was a great book. Nabokov does
a great Kafka. Nabokov also does a great Gogol & Dostoevsky in
Despair (although he disliked Dostoevsky). And he even does a
great Nabokov in the RL of Sebastian Knight & Look at the
Harlequins!
"a good night for mothing."
Another person on rec.arts.books. comments,
Will anybody else on this group admit to loving "America's
Funniest Home Videos"?
Somehow, I think Vladimir Nabokov would have adored this
show...
One of his great contributions to literature (viz the late
debate on progress-in-lit) was the *comic anthromorphization*
of physical objects... and a good percentage of AFHV revolves
around exactly this.
For example, one that struck me especially funny was shot out
a suburban front window during a heavy rain, and the water
flowing down the street had animated a plastic mini-dumpster so
that it seemed to have a mind of its own, stolidly venturing
out into the neighborhood... which is just the sort of thing VN
could capture in a casual line (much better than me)...
Another participant queried:
What can be done to keep Nabokov out of the hands of Youth?
Hey, watch it pal!
Anyway, I was about to ask how we keep youth out of the hands
of our enemies. Or our enemies out of the hands of Nabokov.
Or Nabokov out of Nabokov. Or something like that.
A paragraph, quoted from Anthony Lane's review of Nabokov's Short
Stories appears under the heading "From the Lexicon of Vlad the
Impaler":
Throughout his life, Nabokov strove to emphasize the need for
precision-- to take down the world's particulars and to stake
his claim as one of the great noticers of modern
literature--but there existed in him a contrary talent for
burnishing the recorded facts until they gleamed like the
alchemical products of the imagination. He is, you might say,
a semiprecious writer: neither as bejewelled as his rapturous
clauses (or his many imitators) initially suggest nor as
epistemologically earthbound as he himself liked to pretend.
The indefatigable Nabokov sought only what he saw and
remembered as true, and yet his fiction leaves you with the
appetizing suspicion that truth is overrated.
WWW sites:
Listed below are several websites featuring Nabokov related material.
http://sushi.st.usm.edu/~barthelm/07oct/07amis.html
An interview of Martin Amis with Will Self in which Amis
discusses Nabokov's influence on hiswritings.
http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~sbrewing/nabokov.html
Features some Nabokov links next to an early picture with the
caption *cute when he was a young `un." *
http://www.umr.edu/~edmalone/Nabokov.html
More Nabokov links including some images.
Suellen Stringer-Hye
Special Collections
Jean and Alexander Heard Library
Vanderbilt University
stringers@library.vanderbilt.edu
<stringers@library.vanderbilt.edu> serves to update her "Nabokov in
Cyberspace," pp. 61-70 in the Fall 1995 (#35) of THE NABOKOVIAN. NABOKV-L
once again thanks Suellen Stringer-Hye for her contribution. She is also
the compiler of the CoLOllation pages -- a gathering of items about the
ever popular LOLITA -- on the Nabokov Web Site ZEMBLA.
Nabokov is a favorite on rec.arts books-- no doubt its participants
overlap with some of the members of this list. All newsgroups
like to compose lists, and rec.arts.books is no exception. To the
question: "What books did you get for Christmas?" many respondents
selected _Nabokov' s Short Stories_ as the cherished component of their
Christmas booty. One person received a first edition _Pale Fire_.
Nabokov also ranked high on the list of "Greatest Writers of the
20th Century". Below are excerpts from some of the discussions
surrounding his nomination.
newsgroups: rec.arts.books
Re: Greatest author of the 20th cent?
From: Sirin@ Date: 1995/12/21
I think for sheer consistency and inventiveness I might have
to go with Nabokov.
Finally, I applaud your nomination of Nabokov, who combined
the meticulousness and wordlove of a poet with the fancy of a
novelist.
I am so glad you know this. Nabokov is amazing.
Anyway, of what I've read so far, I like Invitation to a
Beheading best. |The way in which the warden worshipped the
other prisoner was fantastic. |And the idea of being punished
by society for not be transparent!
Yes Invitation to a Beheading was a great book. Nabokov does
a great Kafka. Nabokov also does a great Gogol & Dostoevsky in
Despair (although he disliked Dostoevsky). And he even does a
great Nabokov in the RL of Sebastian Knight & Look at the
Harlequins!
"a good night for mothing."
Another person on rec.arts.books. comments,
Will anybody else on this group admit to loving "America's
Funniest Home Videos"?
Somehow, I think Vladimir Nabokov would have adored this
show...
One of his great contributions to literature (viz the late
debate on progress-in-lit) was the *comic anthromorphization*
of physical objects... and a good percentage of AFHV revolves
around exactly this.
For example, one that struck me especially funny was shot out
a suburban front window during a heavy rain, and the water
flowing down the street had animated a plastic mini-dumpster so
that it seemed to have a mind of its own, stolidly venturing
out into the neighborhood... which is just the sort of thing VN
could capture in a casual line (much better than me)...
Another participant queried:
What can be done to keep Nabokov out of the hands of Youth?
Hey, watch it pal!
Anyway, I was about to ask how we keep youth out of the hands
of our enemies. Or our enemies out of the hands of Nabokov.
Or Nabokov out of Nabokov. Or something like that.
A paragraph, quoted from Anthony Lane's review of Nabokov's Short
Stories appears under the heading "From the Lexicon of Vlad the
Impaler":
Throughout his life, Nabokov strove to emphasize the need for
precision-- to take down the world's particulars and to stake
his claim as one of the great noticers of modern
literature--but there existed in him a contrary talent for
burnishing the recorded facts until they gleamed like the
alchemical products of the imagination. He is, you might say,
a semiprecious writer: neither as bejewelled as his rapturous
clauses (or his many imitators) initially suggest nor as
epistemologically earthbound as he himself liked to pretend.
The indefatigable Nabokov sought only what he saw and
remembered as true, and yet his fiction leaves you with the
appetizing suspicion that truth is overrated.
WWW sites:
Listed below are several websites featuring Nabokov related material.
http://sushi.st.usm.edu/~barthelm/07oct/07amis.html
An interview of Martin Amis with Will Self in which Amis
discusses Nabokov's influence on hiswritings.
http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~sbrewing/nabokov.html
Features some Nabokov links next to an early picture with the
caption *cute when he was a young `un." *
http://www.umr.edu/~edmalone/Nabokov.html
More Nabokov links including some images.
Suellen Stringer-Hye
Special Collections
Jean and Alexander Heard Library
Vanderbilt University
stringers@library.vanderbilt.edu