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[Trivia] Colateral fun with doubles: Pnin and the Twynns
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Twins or doubles can be deadly. John Shade bore a fatal resemblance to Samuel Johnson and to Judge Goldsworth, in Pale Fire.* Delusional similarities, as Hermann's in Despair, or some of the Quiltys in disguise in Lolita, are equally dangerous In Pnin however, the matter gains a silent-movie comic twist, at least in my eyes, because I cannot determine their connection to the plot, only to the author's occasional humoristic curlicues and recurrent themes.
"Pnin and I had long since accepted the disturbing but seldom discussed fact that on any given college staff one could find not only a person who was uncommonly like one's dentist or the local postmaster, but also a person who had a twin within the same professional group, I know, indeed, of a case of triplets at a comparatively small college where, according to its sharp-eyed president, Frank Reade, the radix of the troika was, absurdly enough, myself; and I recall the late Olga Krotki once telling me that... there were as many as six Pnins, besides the genuine and, to me, unique article. It should not be deemed surprising, therefore, that even Pnin...could not help becoming aware ... that a lanky, bespectacled old fellow... - a person whom Pnin knew as Professor Thomas Wynn, Head of the Ornithology Department, having once talked to him at some party about gay golden orioles, melancholy cuckoos, and other Russian countryside birds - was not always Professor Wynn. At times he graded, as it were, into somebody else, whom Pnin did not know by name but whom he classified, with a bright foreigner's fondness for puns as 'Twynn' (or, in Pninian, 'Tvin')
Wynn's double was "Tristram W. Thomas (Tom to his friends), Professor of Anthropology, [who] had obtained ten thousand dollars from the Mandoville Foundation for a study of the eating habits of Cuban fishermen and palm climbers." and poor Pnin "told himself it would be useless to ask anybody's assistance in unravelling the T.Wynns.[ ] On the day of his party,...Wynn, or his double,...suddenly sat down beside him and said:'I have long wanted to ask you something - you teach Russian, don't you? Last summer I was reading a magazine article on birds - ' ('Vin! This is Vin!' said Pnin to himself, and forthwith perceived a decisive course of action).'- well, the author of that article - I don't remember his name, I think it was a Russian one - mentioned that in the Skoff region, I hope I pronounce it right, a local cake is baked in the form of a bird. Basically, of course, the symbol is phallic, but I was wondering if you knew of such a custom?' [ ] 'Sir, I am at your service,' ...'Yes, sir. I know all about those zhavoronki, those alouettes, those - we must consult a dictionary for the English name. So I take the opportunity to extend a cordial invitation to you to visit me this evening...." To add spice to the misunderstanding,. there's Betty's query to Thomas, about a
prof.Fogelman, an expert in bats, who lived in Cuba (Fogelman suggests "Birdman")
And here is the coincidence!!! I just discovered that Prof. Pnin's confusion could have been justified, in a prescient way for years later, in 1977, a Prof. Thomas Wynn would earn his Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Illinois and, together with psychologist Frederick Coolidge they'd publish How to Think Like a Neanderthal, offering a psychological profile of Neanderthals based on archeological evidence.
No phallic symbols nor any palm climbers having a lark, though.
............................................................................................
* - "Take my own case," continued [Shade] "I have been said to resemble at least four people: Samuel Johnson; the lovingly reconstructed ancestor of man in the Exton Museum; and two local characters, one being the slapdash disheveled hag who ladles out the mash..."[...] "I would rather say," remarked Mr. Pardon - American History - "that she looks like Judge Goldsworth" ("One of us," interposed Shade inclining his head), "especially when he is real mad at the whole world after a good dinner."
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"Pnin and I had long since accepted the disturbing but seldom discussed fact that on any given college staff one could find not only a person who was uncommonly like one's dentist or the local postmaster, but also a person who had a twin within the same professional group, I know, indeed, of a case of triplets at a comparatively small college where, according to its sharp-eyed president, Frank Reade, the radix of the troika was, absurdly enough, myself; and I recall the late Olga Krotki once telling me that... there were as many as six Pnins, besides the genuine and, to me, unique article. It should not be deemed surprising, therefore, that even Pnin...could not help becoming aware ... that a lanky, bespectacled old fellow... - a person whom Pnin knew as Professor Thomas Wynn, Head of the Ornithology Department, having once talked to him at some party about gay golden orioles, melancholy cuckoos, and other Russian countryside birds - was not always Professor Wynn. At times he graded, as it were, into somebody else, whom Pnin did not know by name but whom he classified, with a bright foreigner's fondness for puns as 'Twynn' (or, in Pninian, 'Tvin')
Wynn's double was "Tristram W. Thomas (Tom to his friends), Professor of Anthropology, [who] had obtained ten thousand dollars from the Mandoville Foundation for a study of the eating habits of Cuban fishermen and palm climbers." and poor Pnin "told himself it would be useless to ask anybody's assistance in unravelling the T.Wynns.[ ] On the day of his party,...Wynn, or his double,...suddenly sat down beside him and said:'I have long wanted to ask you something - you teach Russian, don't you? Last summer I was reading a magazine article on birds - ' ('Vin! This is Vin!' said Pnin to himself, and forthwith perceived a decisive course of action).'- well, the author of that article - I don't remember his name, I think it was a Russian one - mentioned that in the Skoff region, I hope I pronounce it right, a local cake is baked in the form of a bird. Basically, of course, the symbol is phallic, but I was wondering if you knew of such a custom?' [ ] 'Sir, I am at your service,' ...'Yes, sir. I know all about those zhavoronki, those alouettes, those - we must consult a dictionary for the English name. So I take the opportunity to extend a cordial invitation to you to visit me this evening...." To add spice to the misunderstanding,. there's Betty's query to Thomas, about a
prof.Fogelman, an expert in bats, who lived in Cuba (Fogelman suggests "Birdman")
And here is the coincidence!!! I just discovered that Prof. Pnin's confusion could have been justified, in a prescient way for years later, in 1977, a Prof. Thomas Wynn would earn his Ph.D. in anthropology from the University of Illinois and, together with psychologist Frederick Coolidge they'd publish How to Think Like a Neanderthal, offering a psychological profile of Neanderthals based on archeological evidence.
No phallic symbols nor any palm climbers having a lark, though.
............................................................................................
* - "Take my own case," continued [Shade] "I have been said to resemble at least four people: Samuel Johnson; the lovingly reconstructed ancestor of man in the Exton Museum; and two local characters, one being the slapdash disheveled hag who ladles out the mash..."[...] "I would rather say," remarked Mr. Pardon - American History - "that she looks like Judge Goldsworth" ("One of us," interposed Shade inclining his head), "especially when he is real mad at the whole world after a good dinner."
Search archive with Google:
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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/