Leaving Ardis after his first summer there, Van Veen (the narrator and main character in VN’s novel Ada, 1969) asks Bouteillan (the French butler at Ardis) not to quote Delille to him:
On a sunny September morning, with the trees still green, but the asters and fleabanes already taking over in ditch and dalk, Van set out for Ladoga, N.A., to spend a fortnight there with his father and three tutors before returning to school in cold Luga, Mayne.
Van kissed Lucette on each dimple and then on the neck — and winked to prim Larivière who looked at Marina.
It was time to go. They saw him off: Marina in her shlafrok, Lucette petting (substitutionally) Dack, Mlle Larivière who did not know yet that Van had left behind an inscribed book she had given him on the eve, and a score of copiously tipped servants (among whom we noticed kitchen Kim with his camera) — practically the entire household, except Blanche who had the headache, and dutiful Ada who had asked to be excused, having promised to visit an infirm villager (she had a heart of gold, that child, really — as Marina so willingly, so wisely used to observe).
Van’s black trunk and black suitcase, and black king-size dumbbells, were heaved into the back of the family motorcar; Bouteillan put on a captain’s cap, too big for him, and grape-blue goggles; ‘remouvez votre bottom, I will drive,’ said Van — and the summer of 1884 was over.
‘She rolls sweetly, sir,’ remarked Bouteillan in his quaint old-fashioned English. ‘Tous les pneus sont neufs, but, alas, there are many stones on the way, and youth drives fast. Monsieur should be prudent. The winds of the wilderness are indiscreet. Tel un lis sauvage confiant au désert —’
‘Quite the old comedy retainer, aren’t you?’ remarked Van drily.
‘Non, Monsieur,’ answered Bouteillan, holding on to his cap. ‘Non. Tout simplement j’aime bien Monsieur et sa demoiselle.’
‘If,’ said Van, ‘you’re thinking of little Blanche, then you’d better quote Delille not to me, but to your son, who’ll knock her up any day now,’
The old Frenchman glanced at Van askance, pozheval gubami (chewed his lips), but said nothing. (1.29)
Darkbloom (‘Notes to Ada’): ous les etc.: all the tires are new.
Tel un: thus a wild lily entrusting the wilderness.
non etc.: no, Sir, I simply am very fond of you, Sir, and of your young lady.
Bouteillan quotes Jacques Delille's poem Les trois régnes de la nature (1809). A poet whom Pushkin called parnasskiy muravey (the Parnassian ant), Jacques Delille (1738-1813) brings to mind Leconte de Lisle (1818-94), a French poet of the Parnassian movement. The governess of Van's and Ada's half-sister Lucette, Mlle Larivière writes fiction under the penname Guillaume de Monparnasse (sic, the leaving out of the 't' should make it more intime). Leconte is a homophone of le comte (the Count in French). Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910) was a Count. In Tolstoy's novel Anna Karenin (1875-77) Aleksey Aleksandrovich (Anna's husband) is reading Duc de Lille, Poésie des enfers ("The Poetry of Hells," an invented book):
Допив со сливками и хлебом свой второй стакан чая, Алексей Александрович встал и пошел в свой кабинет.
— А ты никуда не поехала; тебе, верно, скучно было? — сказал он.
— О нет! — отвечала она, встав за ним и провожая его чрез залу в кабинет. — Что же ты читаешь теперь? — спросила она.
— Теперь я читаю Duc de Lille, «Poésie des enfers», — отвечал он. — Очень замечательная книга.
Анна улыбнулась, как улыбаются слабостям любимых людей, и, положив свою руку под его, проводила его до дверей кабинета. Она знала его привычку, сделавшуюся необходимостью, вечером читать. Она знала, что, несмотря на поглощавшие почти все его время служебные обязанности, он считал своим долгом следить за всем замечательным, появлявшимся в умственной сфере. Она знала тоже, что действительно его интересовали книги политические, философские, богословские, что искусство было по его натуре совершенно чуждо ему, но что, несмотря на это, или лучше вследствие этого, Алексей Александрович не пропускал ничего из того, что делало шум в этой области, и считал своим долгом все читать. Она знала, что в области политики, философии, богословия Алексей Александрович сомневался или отыскивал; но в вопросах искусства и поэзии, в особенности музыки, понимания которой он был совершенно лишен, у него были самые определенные и твердые мнения. Он любил говорить о Шекспире, Рафаэле, Бетховене, о значении новых школ поэзии и музыки, которые все были у него распределены с очень ясною последовательностью.
Having drunk his second cup of tea with cream, and bread, Alexey Alexandrovitch got up, and was going towards his study.
"And you’ve not been anywhere this evening? You’ve been dull, I expect?" he said.
"Oh, no!" she answered, getting up after him and accompanying him across the room to his study. "What are you reading now?" she asked.
"Just now I’m reading Duc de Lille, Poésie des Enfers," he answered. "A very remarkable book."
Anna smiled, as people smile at the weaknesses of those they love, and, putting her hand under his, she escorted him to the door of the study. She knew his habit, that had grown into a necessity, of reading in the evening. She knew, too, that in spite of his official duties, which swallowed up almost the whole of his time, he considered it his duty to keep up with everything of note that appeared in the intellectual world. She knew, too, that he was really interested in books dealing with politics, philosophy, and theology, that art was utterly foreign to his nature; but, in spite of this, or rather, in consequence of it, Alexey Alexandrovitch never passed over anything in the world of art, but made it his duty to read everything. She knew that in politics, in philosophy, in theology, Alexey Alexandrovitch often had doubts, and made investigations; but on questions of art and poetry, and, above all, of music, of which he was totally devoid of understanding, he had the most distinct and decided opinions. He was fond of talking about Shakespeare, Raphael, Beethoven, of the significance of new schools of poetry and music, all of which were classified by him with very conspicuous consistency. (Part One, chapter XXXIII)
Leaving Ardis forever, Van identifies himself with Tolstoy's Anna:
Van shook hands with the distressed old butler, thanked Bout for a silver-knobbed cane and a pair of gloves, nodded to the other servants and walked toward the carriage and pair. Blanche, standing by in a long gray skirt and straw hat, with her cheap valise painted mahogany red and secured with a criss-crossing cord, looked exactly like a young lady setting out to teach school in a Wild West movie. She offered to sit on the box next to the Russian coachman but he ushered her into the calèche.
They passed undulating fields of wheat speckled with the confetti of poppies and bluets. She talked all the way about the young chatelaine and her two recent lovers in melodious low tones as if in a trance, as if en rapport with a dead minstrel’s spirit. Only the other day from behind that row of thick firs, look there, to your right (but he did not look — sitting silent, both hands on the knob of his cane), she and her sister Madelon, with a bottle of wine between them, watched Monsieur le Comte courting the young lady on the moss, crushing her like a grunting bear as he also had crushed — many times! — Madelon who said she, Blanche, should warn him, Van, because she was a wee bit jealous but she also said — for she had a good heart — better put it off until ‘Malbrook’ s’en va t’en guerre, otherwise they would fight; he had been shooting a pistol at a scarecrow all morning and that’s why she waited so long, and it was in Madelon’s hand, not in hers. She rambled on and on until they reached Tourbière; two rows of cottages and a small black church with stained-glass windows. Van let her out. The youngest of the three sisters, a beautiful chestnut-curled little maiden with lewd eyes and bobbing breasts (where had he seen her before? — recently, but where?) carried Blanche’s valise and birdcage into a poor shack smothered in climbing roses, but for the rest, dismal beyond words. He kissed Cendrillon’s shy hand and resumed his seat in the carriage, clearing his throat and plucking at his trousers before crossing his legs. Vain Van Veen.
‘The express does not stop at Torfyanka, does it, Trofim?’
‘I’ll take you five versts across the bog,’ said Trofim, ‘the nearest is Volosyanka.’
His vulgar Russian word for Maidenhair; a whistle stop; train probably crowded.
Maidenhair. Idiot! Percy boy might have been buried by now! Maidenhair. Thus named because of the huge spreading Chinese tree at the end of the platform. Once, vaguely, confused with the Venus’-hair fern. She walked to the end of the platform in Tolstoy’s novel. First exponent of the inner monologue, later exploited by the French and the Irish. N’est vert, n’est vert, n’est vert. L’arbre aux quarante écus d’or, at least in the fall. Never, never shall I hear again her ‘botanical’ voice fall at biloba, ‘sorry, my Latin is showing.’ Ginkgo, gingko, ink, inkog. Known also as Salisbury’s adiantofolia, Ada’s infolio, poor Salisburia: sunk; poor Stream of Consciousness, marée noire by now. Who wants Ardis Hall!
‘Barin, a barin,’ said Trofim, turning his blond-bearded face to his passenger.
‘Da?’
‘Dazhe skvoz’ kozhanïy fartuk ne stal-bï ya trogat’ etu frantsuzskuyu devku.’
Barin: master. Dázhe skvoz’ kózhanïy fártuk: even through a leathern apron. Ne stal-bï ya trógat’: I would not think of touching. Étu: this (that). Frantsúzskuyu: French (adj., accus.). Dévku: wench. Úzhas, otcháyanie: horror, despair. Zhálost’: pity, Kóncheno, zagázheno, rastérzano: finished, fouled, torn to shreds. (1.41)
Darkbloom ('Notes to Ada'): marais noir: black tide.