Sandy Klein on "Lingering over ruins..." ( http://whenfallsthecoliseum.com/2010/03/02/lingering-over-ruins-a-very-serious-examination-of-vladimir-nabokovs-the-original-of-laura/) posted a critical review by a precocious reader ( I hope he is now at least ten years-old). I was thrilled to learn that in ToOl (perhaps linked to Nabokov's parenthetic word "rodait," or is it by any trilby?), there's a reference to George du Maurier, writer and cartoonist, who I only knew from his first novel, "Peter Ibbetson" and through a marvellous movie, "Svengali."

Checking for other items, I learned that he inspired Gastoun Leroux's "The Phantom of the Opera," but, most interestingly, there was a caption of "Svengali" - suggestive of our aracnoidal Humbert Humbert, when he extended his web and feelers all over Lolita's house - beneath which were the words "incubus."

How familiar would Nabokov have been with du Maurier? With the "incubus/succubus" lore, so pervasive in "The Enchanter" and in "Lolita", less so in his other novels related to seduction and "influence" ?

All private editorial communications, without exception, are read by both co-editors.

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