At the Zembla site, in the article "Intimations of
Lo:Sirens, Joyce and Nabokov's Lolita" Neil Cornwell mentions that "Almost
at the very beginning of the composition of Lolita, in 1948, Edmund Wilson
supplied Nabokov with volume six of Havelock Ellis's Etudes de Psychologie
Sexuelle (Paris, 1926), which contains a 100-page confessional document written
in French by an anonymous southern Russian: 'Havelock Ellis's Russian sex
masterpiece', as Wilson terms it (N-W 201)".
Brian Boyd's RY (400) has a
succint entry, related to the English translation:" George Hessen, in his role
of perpetual student, could draw on the university library for Havelock Ellis,
Swinburne, and what ever else might distract an avid reader from his
pain."
I couldn't locate again Alfred Appel's entry on Ellis and
fountainism (using the List archives and its google search I only found a quote
from wiki and the address http://listserv.ucsb.edu/lsv-cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0610&L=nabokv-l&F=P&P=21792. ) The indication I needed wasn't available.*
My interest in
Nabokov's familiarity with Elis, this time, derives from a curious entry,
related to "vair color eyes" and its importance for the French writers of yore.
Havelock Ellis' s works are to be found in the internet
(www.scribd.com/.../Studies-in-the-Psychology-of-Sex-Volume-4 - ) but the
chapter that interests me appears, in the French translation,
concerning "La Vision" (tome II, Chapter II) ie, to "beauty and the
exageration of sexual traits" (such as "Stéatopygie" and the influence of
national or racial types in "la beauté.") Cf. papidoc.chic-cm.fr/511Ellisvisionchap2.html -) Havelock Ellis
describes, at length, not only the allure of an "ensellure" (recently
remembered by Tom Rymour), but of the eyes with variations in color
(grey-blue-green).
We know that Nabokov majored in French and
Medieval Literature so, perhaps, his emphasis on Lolita's "vair eyes" must bear
a relation to what I found and quote below (sorry for bringing it only in
French). The inspiration for "Lolita" ( as in the "Enchanter" perhaps, but most
certainly -inspite VN's denials, in "Colette") must derive from some kind of
French "mélange"...
"Dans la Chanson de
Roland, et dans tous les poèmes français du Moyen Âge, les les yeux
sont sans exception vairs. Cette épithète est vague. Le mot, dérivé de
varius, signifie "mélangé", ce que Houday regarde comme une indication
d'irradiations variées, la même qualité qui plus tard fit naître le terme iris
pour désigner la membrane pupillaire (63). Vair ne se rapporterait donc pas
autant à la couleur de l'oeil qu'à ses qualités brillantes et étincelantes. Il
est possible que Houday ait eu raison, mais il demeure probable que l'oeil
décrit comme vair était supposé en même temps de couleur variée. Ce terme
s'appliquerait donc à l'oeil que nous appelons ordinairement gris, c'est-à-dire
bleu dans un cercle de pigment brun, faiblement tacheté. Ces yeux sont assez
typiques pour le nord de la France, et ils sont souvent beaux. Que tel ait
été le cas, cela semble résulter clairement du fait, mentionné par Houday
lui-même, que, quelques siècles plus tard, l'oeil vair était considéré comme
vert, et que les yeux verts étaient célébrés comme les yeux les plus beaux.
L'étymologie était fausse, mais une étymologie fausse ne suffit point à
changer un idéal. À la Renaissance, Jehan Lemaire, décrivant Vénus comme le
type de la beauté, parle de ses yeux verts, et un peu plus tard, Ronsard chante
:
Noir je veux l'oeil et brun le teint,
Bien que l'oeil verd toute la
France adore."
(I underlined the parts that seem to be of
special interest)
..............................................................................
* Wikipedia informs: "According to Ellis in My Life, his friends were
much amused at his being considered an expert on sex considering the fact that
he suffered from impotence until the age of 60, when he discovered that was able
to become aroused by the sight of a woman urinating. His Sexual Inversion, the
first English medical text book on homosexuality, co-authored with John
Addington Symonds, described the sexual relations of homosexual men, something
that Ellis did not consider to be a disease, immoral, or a crime; a bookseller
was prosecuted in 1897 for stocking it. Other psychologically important concepts
developed by Ellis include autoerotism and narcissism, both of which were later
taken on by Sigmund Freud."