Annotations by Alexey Sklyarenko

Like her grandmother, Marina (in VN's novel Ada, 1969, Van's, Ada's and Lucette's mother) likes to have her hair done in the open:

Describing his last night at Ardis, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions his dream in which he saw himself on a mountain smothered in snow, with people, trees, and a cow carried down by an avalanche:

Before the family dinner in "Ardis the Second" Demon Veen (in VN’s novel Ada, 1969, Van's and Ada's father) calls Blanche (a French handmaid at Ardis) "a passing angel:" 

Demon shed his monocle and wiped his eyes with the modish lace-frilled handkerchief that lodged in the heart pocket of his dinner jacket. His tear glands were facile in action when no real sorrow made him control himself.

In VN's novel Pnin (1957) Laurence Clements (Pnin's landlord) compares the night sky to a fluorescent corpse:

It was a fair fall night, velvet below, steel above.

Joan asked: 'You're sure you don't want us to give you a lift?'

'It's a ten-minute walk. And a walk is a must on such a wonderful night.'

The three of them stood for a moment gazing at the stars.

'And all these are worlds,' said Hagen.

When Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) visits Philip Rack (Lucette's music teacher who was poisoned by his jealous wife Elsie) in Ward Five of the Kalugano hospital (where Van recovers from a wound received in a pistol duel with Captain Tapper), the male nurse Dorofey reads an article in the Russian-language newspaper Golos (Logos):

Before the family dinner in "Ardis the Second" Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) mentions a fresh oeillet in his father's lapel eye:

Demon shed his monocle and wiped his eyes with the modish lace-frilled handkerchief that lodged in the heart pocket of his dinner jacket. His tear glands were facile in action when no real sorrow made him control himself.

Describing his perfromance in variety shows as Mascodagama (when he dances tango on his hands), Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) says that the work of a poet, and only a poet could have adequately described a certain macabre quiver that marked his extraordinary act :

Describing the king’s escape from Zembla, Kinbote (in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, Shade’s mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla) mentions the good grunter (mountain farmer) in whose house the king spent the night:

Describing the king’s escape from Zembla, Kinbote (in VN’s novel Pale Fire, 1962, Shade’s mad commentator who imagines that he is Charles the Beloved, the last self-exiled king of Zembla) mentions lazy Garh, the farmer's daughter who shows to the king the shortest way to the pass:

Describing Villa Venus (Eric Veen's floramors), Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN's novel Ada, 1969) mentions a special chair built for King Victor (the Antiterran ruler of the British Commonwealth who frequents floramors):