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Re: Nabokov and Twelve-Year-Old Girls ... edited to show speakers
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In a message dated 2/29/2012 9:43:13 AM Central Standard Time,
Rsgwynn1@CS.COM writes:
>
> RSGwynn: [to JM's this is a very good line of argumentation, considering
> Quilty "as an invention within the invention"...] So HH wrote the Foreword
> under the pseudonym of John Ray, Jr., Ph. D., and then conveniently died in
> prison a few days before his trial for the figurative murder of CQ? More
> meta- than this fiction needs, I think.
>
> JM: Is it always necessary to resort to meta-fiction while exploring the
> possible worlds of a novel? How shall we consider the status of "Gradus" in
> "Pale Fire," or Kinbote's reports about his actual delusions?
>
> If Humbert Humbert had simply been transfered from the psychopathic ward
> to an insane asylum after committing a crime, his notes and John Ray,Jr.'s
> foreword would fit into the ordinary scheme of the novel. HH might even
> have killed some other guy who he thought had been his nymphet's stalker and
> abductor (like J.Shade's murder, instead of J.Goldsworth's, in PF, as
> another reference to VN's father's assassination in Berlin?).
>
> RSGwynn: I'm sure thatVN continually returned to the "primal scene" of his
> father's assassination, which could not have been less than the most
> significant event of his whole life. I don't think that Humbert's murder of CQ
> is very relevant here, but the accidental murder of JS probably is, at
> least in some remote autobiographical way.
>
> Did Humbert murder CQ? Yes, if we believe that he is being held in
> solitary confinement (after being in a psychiatric ward) before his trial, where
> he writes "Lolita, or "The Confession of a White, Widowed Male" in the time
> leading up to its beginning. He is spared the trial by his "fortunate"
> death (kind of like Krug's madness in BS ). If you disagree with this, you
> must (1) come up with an alternate crime that HH is being held and tried for
> (driving on the wrong side of the road?); or (2) a belief that someone can
> be tried for the crime of "figurative murder."
>
> I won't even go into the whole Gradus thing except to ask one simple
> question: Why did VN go to such pains to establish the Goldsworth/Grey
> connection except as foreshadowing to give a "rational" explanation as to why JS
> (who resembled the Judge and was just outside his house) was shot by an
> escaped madman as a result of mistaken identity? Red herrings galore? I don't
> think so. Gradus is Kinbote's fantasy (How does he know about the various
> movements of Gradus in Europe, for example, except from reports from his
> equally fantastical sources, which may be totally his own invention?).
>
> Doesn't Kinbote say something like "Lord, make it stop"? There are plenty
> of clues that he is V. Botkin, in thrall to a second, now stronger
> identity.
>
> RSG
It belatedly occurs to me that HH would have doubtless pled guilty at his
trial, so his "confession" is his only way of getting his story into the
public record.
RSG
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Rsgwynn1@CS.COM writes:
>
> RSGwynn: [to JM's this is a very good line of argumentation, considering
> Quilty "as an invention within the invention"...] So HH wrote the Foreword
> under the pseudonym of John Ray, Jr., Ph. D., and then conveniently died in
> prison a few days before his trial for the figurative murder of CQ? More
> meta- than this fiction needs, I think.
>
> JM: Is it always necessary to resort to meta-fiction while exploring the
> possible worlds of a novel? How shall we consider the status of "Gradus" in
> "Pale Fire," or Kinbote's reports about his actual delusions?
>
> If Humbert Humbert had simply been transfered from the psychopathic ward
> to an insane asylum after committing a crime, his notes and John Ray,Jr.'s
> foreword would fit into the ordinary scheme of the novel. HH might even
> have killed some other guy who he thought had been his nymphet's stalker and
> abductor (like J.Shade's murder, instead of J.Goldsworth's, in PF, as
> another reference to VN's father's assassination in Berlin?).
>
> RSGwynn: I'm sure thatVN continually returned to the "primal scene" of his
> father's assassination, which could not have been less than the most
> significant event of his whole life. I don't think that Humbert's murder of CQ
> is very relevant here, but the accidental murder of JS probably is, at
> least in some remote autobiographical way.
>
> Did Humbert murder CQ? Yes, if we believe that he is being held in
> solitary confinement (after being in a psychiatric ward) before his trial, where
> he writes "Lolita, or "The Confession of a White, Widowed Male" in the time
> leading up to its beginning. He is spared the trial by his "fortunate"
> death (kind of like Krug's madness in BS ). If you disagree with this, you
> must (1) come up with an alternate crime that HH is being held and tried for
> (driving on the wrong side of the road?); or (2) a belief that someone can
> be tried for the crime of "figurative murder."
>
> I won't even go into the whole Gradus thing except to ask one simple
> question: Why did VN go to such pains to establish the Goldsworth/Grey
> connection except as foreshadowing to give a "rational" explanation as to why JS
> (who resembled the Judge and was just outside his house) was shot by an
> escaped madman as a result of mistaken identity? Red herrings galore? I don't
> think so. Gradus is Kinbote's fantasy (How does he know about the various
> movements of Gradus in Europe, for example, except from reports from his
> equally fantastical sources, which may be totally his own invention?).
>
> Doesn't Kinbote say something like "Lord, make it stop"? There are plenty
> of clues that he is V. Botkin, in thrall to a second, now stronger
> identity.
>
> RSG
It belatedly occurs to me that HH would have doubtless pled guilty at his
trial, so his "confession" is his only way of getting his story into the
public record.
RSG
Search archive with Google:
http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=site:listserv.ucsb.edu&HL=en
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Visit "Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
Manage subscription options: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/