Subject
Behind Jupiter and Eggs
From
Date
Body
Quotes from former posting on Jupiter Olorinus:
"Their open mouths met in tender fury, and then he pounced upon her new, young, divine, Japanese neck which he had been coveting like a veritable Jupiter Olorinus throughout the evening."
"In the lounge, as seen through its entrance, the huge memorable oil - three ample-haunched Ledas swapping lacustrine impressions - had been replaced by a neoprimitive masterpiece showing three yellow eggs and a pair of plumber's gloves on what looked like wet bathroom tiling."*
The lounge of the "Trois Cygnes" had been decorated with three Ledas chatting about lakes and latrines ("lacustrine"), which were replaced by the image of three yellow eggs,gloves and bathroom tiles. Did Leda's offspring come from three eggs, not two?
Could Leda have adopted the third egg, containing the daughter of Nemesis, "Helen of Troy"?
These questions seemed important because they reminded me of Aqua, who fostered her sister's son, like Leda with a third egg. However, many details seem to be reversed and the whole issue is confused. The redecorated lobby introduces one other item that is worth considering, due to the bathroom sex-scenes mentioned in "Ada, or Ardor." I wouldn't have thought about them had the new edition of "The Nabokovian"(number 67, Fall 2011)failed to arrive yesterday. It brings additional links about lacustrine matters in part I (baths, lavatories and the "behind" theme).
At the Three Swanns hotel, events describe a kind of avian confusion of erotic zones (a cloacal non-discrimination between what is vaginal and what is anal). These could be connected to Jupiter metamorphosed in swan, to Leda's laying eggs and, perhaps, to bathroom sex-scenes. In the example below the "behind-theme", brought up by Brian Boyd, deals not only "the suede-soft root" but with "the familiar,incomparable, crimson-lined lips"
Besides, the description that realistically describes Ada's grip on "the twin cock crosses" marks the words "twin", the duplicated flow of water from the taps, and brings in "crosses" (later insistently associated only to Lucette)
"But mad, obstinate Van shed his terry and followed her into the bathroom, where she strained across the low tub to turn on both taps and then bent over to insert the bronze chained plug; it got sucked in by itself, however, while he steadied her lovely lyre and next moment was at the suede-soft root, was gripped, was deep between the familiar, incomparable, crimson-lined lips. She caught at the twin cock crosses, thus involuntarily increasing the sympathetic volume of the water's noise, and Van emitted a long groan of deliverance, and now their four eyes were looking again into the azure brook of Pinedale, and Lucette pushed the door open with a perfunctory knuckle knock " (p.392/393)
On his annotations to ADA 34, part I, Ch 34, Brian Boyd writes (p.58):"Lucette's spying on Van and Ada making love builds on its 1884 base into 1888...The 'behind' theme, of Van making love to Ada from behind, never before tied to Lucette's onlooking, here recurs repeatedly, in Van clasping Ada at the window ledge (212), or as she swings up high enough to see "the astounding tandem."(213).. As I suggested in Boyd 2001, 134-36 and 139-44, Nabokov uses the 'behind' theme to imply that Van and Ada have 'buggered up' Lucette's life."
I don't see why the "behind" theme necessarily leads to a "buggering up" of Lucette's life, because this position isn't always related to anal penetration by Nabokov.
The Van Olorinus "cloacal fantasy" might be interesting to explore (I must still check BB's 'Nabokov's Ada -The Place of Consciousness). Freud's use of the word "in tandem" also came to my mind but I couldn't find it when I searched the internet searching for the main "Wolf Man's" dream,. where I'm almost certain that it appears although, in this instance, it's related to anal fantasies and castration anxiety: "...Freud was at work on his case history of the "Wolf Man" (1918b [1914]), where castration played a prominent role in the "reconstruction" of his patient's infantile neurosis. The Wolf Man sought through identification to assume the passive position of his mother during sexual intercourse; he chose the fantasy of anal penetration by his father, implicit in which was a castration fantasy."
Read more: http://www.answers.com/topic/castration-complex#ixzz1kW5xdhqn
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* Wikipedia (and other sources): "Zeus took the form of a swan and raped Leda on the same night she slept with her husband King Tyndareus. In some versions, she laid two eggs from which the children hatched: Helen (later known as the beautiful "Helen of Troy"), Clytemnestra, and Castor and Pollux."
"Another account of the myth states that Nemesis (???????) was the mother of Helen, and was also impregnated by Zeus in the guise of a swan. A shepherd found the egg and gave it to Leda, who carefully kept it in a chest until the egg hatched. When the egg hatched, Leda adopted Helen as her daughter. Zeus also commemorated the birth of Helen by creating the constellation Cygnus (??????), the Swan, in the sky.""As the "Goddess of Rhamnous", Nemesis was...a daughter of Oceanus, the primeval river-ocean that encircles the world...In Greek mythology, Nemesis...was the spirit of divine retribution against those who succumb to hubris (arrogance before the gods)."
In Greek mythology Nyx (???, "night"), Nox in Roman translation is the deity of the night. In Hesiod's Theogony, Nyx is born of Chaos...With Erebus the deity of shadow and darkness, Nyx gives birth to Aether (atmosphere) and Hemera (day). Later, on her own, Nyx gives birth to Momus (blame), Moros (doom), Thanatos (death), Hypnos (sleep), the Oneiroi (dreams), the Hesperides, the Keres and Moirai (Fates), Nemesis (retribution), Apate (deception), Philotes (friendship), Geras (age), and Eris (strife)."
Omniscient, or "omni-incest" Van, "recollects": "The sky was also heartless and dark, and her body, her head, and particularly those damned thirsty trousers, felt clogged with Oceanus Nox, n,o,x. At every slap and splash of cold wild salt, she heaved with anise-flavored nausea and there was an increasing number, okay, or numbness, in her neck and arms. As she began losing track of herself, she thought it proper to inform a series of receding Lucettes - telling them to pass it on and on in a trick-crystal regression - that what death amounted to was only a more complete assortment of the infinite fractions of solitude."
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