Message

Hello, Jansy,

I will do my best. I Think the translator's abilities quote comes from either the VN + E. Wilson letters edited by Simon Karlinski. They may have come from the Evgene Onegin commentary, but something tells me he would not put such a trivial remark in such an important work. Just possibly, the remark is from Speak Memory. I will ask a few Nabokovian friends.

When I said Nabokov "ruled language" I'm afraid I engaged in a Detroiterism, my birthplace, and the home of hyperbole and much else. I meant mainly that Nabakov stood as a giant among writers, nothing more.

In transcending borders, I meant that both in his life and in the years since his death his books have transcended borders and languages and will be read with pleasure by millions of people who speak tongues neither of us can. Unless I unintentionally diminish your abilities. I speak only English. I've done a lot of reading and I can get some understanding from books written in French, Italian, German, and Spanish. I doubt I could write a postcard in any of those languages.

Actually, for the source of the quote we can turn more easily to Martin Amis because he has quoted it in a recent essay. I would not be surprised if he had invoked it in his Koba book. Or in Experience. But I have read it in the original VN, as well.

I cannot and did not mean to say that VN had "transcended borders" physically in life. As I said in my post, nihilists and bureaucrats, and soldiers, did their utmost to make Russia and Europe a Hell for any artist traveling with a Jewish wife and a young son. Especially a former nobleman.

----- Original Message -----

From: D. Barton Johnson

To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU

Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2004 12:12 PM

Subject: Fw: Fw: Fw: Petty nationalism

----- Original Message -----
From: Jansy Berndt de Souza Mello

To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum

Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2004 4:51 AM

Subject: Re: Fw: Fw: Petty nationalism

Hello, AS Brown

    I couldn´t follow two items of your message:

    a)  what do you mean with " Nabokov ruled language"?

    b) " to transcend borders" refers to VN´s oeuvre or to his physicality "in life"?

    Could you find the quotation about VN and "translation"? Unfortunately, your paraphrase didn´t ring any mnemic bell for me, nor did it help me to learn which for you were the other "serious" points of  VN besides language and translation...

    I´m a hasty writer and I think it is comforting when more people write spontaneously of their "thoughts on the way to somewhere else". This means that we are open to discuss matters that interest us and be enriched by the arguments we get in return. You observed that you " would advise against any of my hastily conceived and hectically typed notions being given any undo weight". Please, don´t take my questions above as trying to give such "undue weight" nor as attempts to "undo" the weight of your ponderations.

    Jansy