Subject
Ryleev in The Event
From
Date
Body
Элеонора Шнап. Я то же самое говорю. Они были так счастливы! На чём держится людское счастье? На тоненькой-тоненькой ниточке! (According to Shnap, human happiness hangs on a very thin string. The Event, Act Two)
Шут на нитке ("a clown on a string") is the phrase that Pushkin probably had in mind when, on a page above his drawing of five little men dangling from a gibbet, he wrote an unfinished line: И я бы мог, как шут на... (And I might, like a clown upon...) One of these unfortunate men was Pushkin's friend, the poet Kondratiy Ryleev (1795-1826).
According to VN (Speak, Memory, Chapter Three, 2), Le Chemin du Pendu ("the Road of the Hanged One") in the park of Batovo received its name after Ryleev, the former owner of Batovo. A couple decades after Ryleev's execution, Batovo was acquired from the state by VN's paternal great-grandmother, Nina Aleksandrovna Shishkov, later Baroness von Korff.
According to Troshcheykin's sister-in-law Vera, the niece of Eleonora Shnap's first husband (Professor Esser, who garbled the Russian version of the saying "a friend in need is a friend indeed") was married to Barbashin's first cousin (Act Two). Shnap being повивальная бабка (midwife), бабка being Russian for "grandmother" and Barbashin being the devil, Shnap is what we call in Russian чёртова бабушка ("the devil's grandmother").
The mother of Lyubov' ("Love") and Vera ("Faith"), Antonina Pavlovna complains to Shnap that she does not have the third daughter named Nadezhda ("Hope"). But Shnap misconstrues Antonina Pavlovna's words as "situation is hopeless."
Nadezhda is mentioned by Pushkin in his famous poem "Во глубине сибирских руд..." ("Deep in Siberian mines..." 1827) addressed to his friends, the exiled Decembrists:
Несчастья верная сестра, Надежда...
Misfortune's faithful sister, Hope...
Lyubov' and Druzhba (Friendship) are also mentioned in Pushkin's poem.
Btw., Leonid Barbashin is a namesake of Leonid Andreev, the author of "Рассказ о семи повешенных" ("The Story of Seven Hanged Men," 1908).
Alexey Sklyarenko
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/
Шут на нитке ("a clown on a string") is the phrase that Pushkin probably had in mind when, on a page above his drawing of five little men dangling from a gibbet, he wrote an unfinished line: И я бы мог, как шут на... (And I might, like a clown upon...) One of these unfortunate men was Pushkin's friend, the poet Kondratiy Ryleev (1795-1826).
According to VN (Speak, Memory, Chapter Three, 2), Le Chemin du Pendu ("the Road of the Hanged One") in the park of Batovo received its name after Ryleev, the former owner of Batovo. A couple decades after Ryleev's execution, Batovo was acquired from the state by VN's paternal great-grandmother, Nina Aleksandrovna Shishkov, later Baroness von Korff.
According to Troshcheykin's sister-in-law Vera, the niece of Eleonora Shnap's first husband (Professor Esser, who garbled the Russian version of the saying "a friend in need is a friend indeed") was married to Barbashin's first cousin (Act Two). Shnap being повивальная бабка (midwife), бабка being Russian for "grandmother" and Barbashin being the devil, Shnap is what we call in Russian чёртова бабушка ("the devil's grandmother").
The mother of Lyubov' ("Love") and Vera ("Faith"), Antonina Pavlovna complains to Shnap that she does not have the third daughter named Nadezhda ("Hope"). But Shnap misconstrues Antonina Pavlovna's words as "situation is hopeless."
Nadezhda is mentioned by Pushkin in his famous poem "Во глубине сибирских руд..." ("Deep in Siberian mines..." 1827) addressed to his friends, the exiled Decembrists:
Несчастья верная сестра, Надежда...
Misfortune's faithful sister, Hope...
Lyubov' and Druzhba (Friendship) are also mentioned in Pushkin's poem.
Btw., Leonid Barbashin is a namesake of Leonid Andreev, the author of "Рассказ о семи повешенных" ("The Story of Seven Hanged Men," 1908).
Alexey Sklyarenko
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/