Jansy/Sergey: by chance, as yr emails arrived, I was reading VN’s Foreword to Speak, Memory (1966 Revised Edition, Wideview/Perigee). Teasingly, he wrote:
“ ... I planned to entitle the British edition Speak, Mnemosyne but was told that ‘little old ladies would not want to ask for a book whose title they could not pronounce.’” [p. 11]
Quite apart from possible mispronunciation (e.g., wrongly assuming it rhymed with Ould Lang Syne!), I can imagine readers of all sizes and genders being unaware of how the Goddess Mnemosyne, the personification of Memory, fitted into the grand scheme of Greek mythology. Remarkably, following nine nights in Zeus’s randy bed, Mnemosyne gave birth to the nine Muses. It’s worth reviewing each of their roles in Greek culture:
Calliope (Epic Poetry); Clio (History); Erato (Love Poetry); Euterpe (Music); Melpomene (Tragedy); Polyhymnia (Hymns) ;Terpsichore (Dance); Thalia (Comedy); and especially Urania (Astronomy), which presumably included Geometry/Mathematics.
Without delving into Platonic views on anamnesis, I found it interesting that VN pondered invoking the Mother of all these diverse creative/imaginative spirits when naming his Memoirs.
Stan Kelly-Bootle.
On 18/04/2010 17:13, "jansymello" <jansy@AETERN.US> wrote:
Sergey Karpukhin ( to Jansy): "Nabokov did not introduce "Phaedo" in any way, I don't think. If anything, Plato speaks of anamnesis in other dialogues, too. The way I see it, VN just said that in his opinion imagination is a form of memory; and since he was aware that his statement could be construed as an application of Plato's concept of anamnesis, he distanced himself from Plato by means of a pun."
JM: After I sent the posting in which I wrote "What could have been Nabokov's intention by introducing "Phaedo," in this depreciatory way, while he'd been arguing about memory and imagination as "a negation of time"?" I realized, too late, that I had taken Sergey Karpukhin's words about "Phaedo," as indicating a deliberate reference to it by Nabokov (thank you, S.K, for your correction.).
I dwelt on this matter later on in connection to Plato's theory about the immortality of the soul, archetypes, anamnesis/recollections. Since I know very little philosophy I must, again, formulate my conjectures as a question: Would Nabokov have rejected Plato because what he valued most, in relation to "recollections," were the individual historical registers, small gestures and transient mnemonic details which for Plato were irrelevant?
Haphazard bibliographical items related to Nab-List recent postings:
(a) At the end of Akiko Nakata's 2008 bibliography for "A Failed Reader Redeemed: "Spring in Fialta" and "The Real Life of Sebastian Knight" (published in the last issue of "Nabokov Studies") there is a White, Edmund "Nabokov's Passion." Vladimir Nabokov, Ed. Harold Bloom; Modern Critical Views, New York: Chelsea House Publishders, 1987,209-22.
(b) Related to "desire": David Packman "Vladimir Nabokov: The Structure of Literary Desire." University of Missouri Press, Columbia & London, 1982.*
(c) Christoph Henry-Thommes "Recollection, Memory and Imagination, Selected Autobiographical Novels of Vladimir Nabokov." American Studies, A Monograph Series, volume 132. Universitätsverlag. Winter, Heidelberg.*
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* - thanks to Jacob Wilkenfeld, who sent me copies of these texts.