Ron Rosenbaum: "With Jansy, I too wonder about Chabon
on PF. Doesn't he misread it entirely? If anyone "tucked" anything into John
Shade's poem it was Kinbote who crammed the entire Zemblan fantasy into Shade's
poem. Obviously VN created Kinbote, but also obviously did not share his mad
misprision. I would, however, suggest (I do't think I'm alone) that Zembla does
correspond in some ways with the lost homeland of VN. There is the anti-royalist
coup in a "northern land" that forced the family of VN and (in his fantasy)
Kinbote/Botkin to flee assassins."
Jansy Mello: You stated the matter with precision when
you noted that, although VN created Kinbote, it was this character the
one who "tucked" the entire Zemblan fantasy into Shade's poem, by
means of his commentary. Although I never visited Russia, nor VN's
childhood world, I also agree with you that Zembla does correspond in some
ways to VN's lost homeland (the cracked ice-sheets on a sidewalk, the racemosa
bloom, the expected contrast between the aristocratic "monde" and the
people.
Your formulation allowed me to wonder, for the first time, why
did Nabokov choose the perspective of a gay, egocentric
and delirious King to write about his private pains of exile and
estrangement.