Subject:
FW: [NABOKV-L] Hunted Enchanters query
From:
"Dmitri Nabokov"
Date:
Fri, 24 Mar 2006 11:32:28 +0100
To:
<NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU>

A reply for Anthony Stadlen: When time came to do posthumous translations of Volshebnik into sevaral languages, I felt duty-bound to follow Father's express instructions to use the title The Enchanter and its variants. I too was a little uncomfortable about the juxtaposition with his frequently stated view that a writer should, above all, be "an enchanter." But cannot one adapt the use of a word to different moments and different contexts? In the novella, Arthur (explicitly named only in a draft version) tries to enchant his prey -- or fantasizes that he is doing so -- in order to achieve his end, while a writer, for VN, should create an aura of aesthetic enchantment wherein his reader's first experience will be the famous tingle of the spine. DN

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