In A Defense of
Poetry (1819), Shelley qualifies the shock of poetic inspiration as “a
visitation”: "We are aware of evanescent visitations of thought and feeling
... sometimes regarding our own mind alone”. While
reading The Defense the foreign reader may be as affected as
Sklyarenko (when he writes: "I rely entirely
on my feel of the language...Readers with a hypersensitive ear can also discern
lozh', "lie", in that name ...Luzhin can come from ludit', 'to
tin'...,"). And yet, because this is one of VN's Russian
novels, the wealth of sonorous intuitive
associations derived from other languages, not the
Russian, are seldom adequate. I understand that this associative
breadth only becomes possible after Nabokov started to write
directly in English.
Lucette's name, for
example,conjures up "little light", whereas Luzhin reminds me of
luminousness and "lucent" objects - but, in his case, I must always
remind myself that this particular association ( linked to what Victor
Fet aptly described as "personal linguistic
emotions" ) is totally out of context.
The information
about "luzhin-ludit"
(tin-coating) might have led one to the Latin "ludus"
(playfulness) and "Homo ludens," - an hypothesis which would
only hold had VN addressed himself, at that time, to a multilingual
readership (besides, inspite of his chess-game obsession, Luzhin
doesn't fit in the guise of a playful guy...)
As I see it,
Nabokov welded a vocabulary whose "shadows" and music elicit a
kind of "idioletic" response, probably quite unlike a response
to Joyce's.
For Nabokov, we think “in
shadows of words” whereas, for him, James Joyce lends “too much verbal
body to his thoughts”.
Perhaps all the
derivations of Luzhin's name, even if unintended by VN and irrespective of
established etymologies, may be added to one's private "shadowy"
vocabulary?
......................................
Victor Fet
responds: As a remote outside observer of Luzhin etymology, and a native Russian
speaker, I would say that there is really nothing in both books that
distinguishes Dostoevsky's Luzhin from Nabokov's. One does not know from
the context whether the name comes from the town of Luga or from "luzha" the
puddle. There is also a third possible connection, not discussed here yet. My
personal linguistic emotions always connected Luzhin name (at least in
Dostoevsky's less pleasant character) with a Russian adjective "LUZHENYJ"
(tin-coated, tin-lined), derived from the verb "ludit" (to coat with tin).
Indeed it is the only Russian word starting with "LUZH.." other than "luzha" and
related "luzhajka".
Tin-coating was a popular street craft in Dostoevsky's
time, and there is а classic image of a tinker ("ludilshchik") man coming
to inner yards of St Petersburg houses with a call "ludit'-payat'!"
("tin-coating, soldering!"). It was a common Gypsy occupation in Russia.
More
important, a very common derived idiom "LUZHENAYA GLOTKA" ('tin-coated throat")
meant "he has a good pair of lungs", which Dostoevsky's outspoken Luzhin clearly
fits--he is nearly the only strongmen in C & P.
Etymology in Russian may
be tricky, and we can read meanings into it -- but judging from the context
there is nothing that tells the cocktail Molotov from the original hero of
Pomyalovsky's novel "Molotov".
Or a Lensky from a
Lenin.