In this wry, judiciously balanced, and thoroughly engaging book, Galya Diment explores the complicated and fascinating relationship between Vladimir Nabokov and his Cornell colleague Marc Szeftel who, in the estimate of many, served as the prototype for the gentle protagonist of the novel Pnin. She offers astute comments on Nabokov's fictional process in creating Timofey Pnin and addresses hotly debated questions and long-standing riddles in Pnin and its history.
Galya Diment is professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures and Thomas L. & Margo G. Wyckoff Endowed Faculty Fellow at the University of Washington, Seattle. She is the author, most recently, of A Russian Jew of Bloomsbury (2011).