Victor Fet [to C.Kunin] No, no.
"Quercus ruslanicus Chat." is of course correct. "Chat." here is an abbreviation
of author's surname (=person who described the species), as "L." for Linnaeus
and "Nab." for Nabokov. "chateaubriandiensis" (or more correctly
"chateaubriandi") would be the species name (epithet), teh second word in
Linnaean binomen. Say, in "Quercus chateaubriandi S. K.-B."
I realized
that there are other important oaks to take into consideration, including in an
old lithograph (I initially thought that the oaks in Ardis were linked
to the reference to Pushkin and to Chateaubriand & devoid of sexual
correlations)..
Is
it suggested that "in tandem" implies anal intercourse
only (reinforced by its association to Lucette's spying and the artist's
"pederast" name)?
Cf:
212.27: partly leafless but still healthy old oak: Cf. 51.23: “the old
oak aches, the old lover
aches”;
“Oh! qui me rendra mon
Aline
Et
le grand chêne et ma
colline?
Oh, who will give me back my
Jill
And
the big oak tree and my hill?” (138.13-16);
and also, perhaps: 146.32: “Oats
and oaks may be dead.”
In his
afterword, Brian Boyd notes "...the image of the lithograph of the old oak on
which Lucette swings to a vantage point on “the astounding tandem” (213) that
Van and Ada form in the locked pavilion. The lithograph is by Peter de
Rast..."