I really appreciate the way Nabokov is able to build a world in the readers mind. The people and their surroundings are vivid and tangible. I appreciate the way he explores the darker desires of the mind. The pain of regret and loss leaves me feeling as is I lived the narrators heartache.
Ada is marvelous and absolutely the most ambitious book I’ve read from Nabokov, but I think Lolita is still probably his best. There’s something so satisfying to me about a novel that can completely shatter the nature of fiction without ever explicitly trying to.
Great video, I had a question. The two major paternal figures living in the world of the book are Demon and Dan. Given the names and two natures of the two characters (one a lawyer the other old money) it seems to me that this is an allusion to another work of literature "the devil and Daniel Webster". That book, like dan and demons conflict, is about the conflict between a lawyer (whose a stand in for the new american man) and a prince (a stand in for old world aristocracy). If this is the case (that the naming of the two characters is an allusion to this other book) it could explain a variety of other themes and aspects of the world of the book, the Abraham Milton/Milton Abraham doubling specifically. Wanted to know if you or anyone else had any thoughts on this?
Hey 👋 fellow 1❤Sirin Heads up! 2024 Will be Nabokov's year. DJBBIC / Let me drop a bomb on you... Vladimir Nabokov constructed the -gry riddle #letthatsinkin ❤
This was lovely to watch. I have to admit I got swept up by the beautiful prose and language of this book and did not notice certain elements that you brought up, so thank you for pointing those out! Such as Antiterra and what that encompassed. I'm hoping to give it a reread with these in mind and see how it'll enhance my enjoyment of it
It is very nice to hear your opinion about the book, which I really like. It seems to me that Van and Ada were no longer alive when they wrote this book. Sometimes it seemed that the "voices" of Aqua and Lucetta were heard in the book, although we know that everything is written by Van. This book is very interesting, I love it!)
There is a wonderful audio Pale Fire on RUclips, was anyway, perfectly read and histrionized. I had read PF twice before listening. The audio is perfectly pitched and bafooned!
For the Joycean echo of "pouting pensively, pensively caressing," you may want the end of "The Dead", with its "falling faintly throughout the universe and faintly falling..." As for Part I of the book being written and annotated during Ada and Van's youth, I'm not convinced. Many of the annotations are in "Ada's late hand"; the strongest textual counterargument is on p.15, with an annotation marked "Marginal jotting in Ada's 1965 hand; crossed out lightly in her latest wavering one." One thing I wonder about this book (having finished it recently), is really *why* it has been set on Antiterra, and especially why Nabokov choses to ban electricity. (Not why in the novel electricity was banned, but why Nabakov decided to include this element.) Is it just to make Antiterra both real and surreal, like a dream? To enrich the abstract meditations on the nature of Time by deliberately providing a world whose historical time cannot be placed-where, for instance, there are airplanes but no telephones? The other thing that strikes me about this novel, especially compared with Gravity's Rainbow, is, for all of its hyper-baroque complexity, how *simple* it really is. It's the story of siblings who fall in love and are kept apart by society and family until those families have died. Even Lolita and Pale Fire, even Pnin, doesn't have such a simple story at its core (at least for me). Thanks for the video!
I always felt like it was a part of Nabokov's point. The way telling is as (or more) important than the thing itself. The story is complex because the way of telling it is. Form and content are one united thing. But I wouldn't say simple, it's ''deceptively simple'' like most of that universe.
Hey, thanks for the comment! I think because I recorded it on a webcam I can't make the earlier videos 144p, but most of the later ones should have lower quality available.
I love this book as well. His books are so intricately structured, well written, sensual and weird and dark at the same time. Several of his books flows so easy and smooth they feel like movies, I’m puzzled why they are not adapted more often.
Ada is Nabokov's Finnegans Wake: it exhibits all the vices that Nabokov criticized in Joyce's similarly self-indulgent work. But it remains enthralling.
As an Australian “Ada” and “Ardor” sound exactly the same, probably hence the exaggerative pronunciation. Though I understand the similarity is somewhat the point.
I really appreciate the way Nabokov is able to build a world in the readers mind. The people and their surroundings are vivid and tangible. I appreciate the way he explores the darker desires of the mind. The pain of regret and loss leaves me feeling as is I lived the narrators heartache.
I agree that this is Nabokov’s best. Just finished it today. So immersive, fun, dark, surreal and detailed
Ada is marvelous and absolutely the most ambitious book I’ve read from Nabokov, but I think Lolita is still probably his best. There’s something so satisfying to me about a novel that can completely shatter the nature of fiction without ever explicitly trying to.
Completely agree! I think in my video on Pnin, I mention that I've come to feel Lolita is Nabokov's 'best novel', but Ada is the best 'Nabokov novel'.
Great video, I had a question. The two major paternal figures living in the world of the book are Demon and Dan. Given the names and two natures of the two characters (one a lawyer the other old money) it seems to me that this is an allusion to another work of literature "the devil and Daniel Webster". That book, like dan and demons conflict, is about the conflict between a lawyer (whose a stand in for the new american man) and a prince (a stand in for old world aristocracy). If this is the case (that the naming of the two characters is an allusion to this other book) it could explain a variety of other themes and aspects of the world of the book, the Abraham Milton/Milton Abraham doubling specifically. Wanted to know if you or anyone else had any thoughts on this?
Hey 👋 fellow 1❤Sirin Heads up! 2024 Will be Nabokov's year. DJBBIC / Let me drop a bomb on you... Vladimir Nabokov constructed the -gry riddle
#letthatsinkin ❤
This was lovely to watch. I have to admit I got swept up by the beautiful prose and language of this book and did not notice certain elements that you brought up, so thank you for pointing those out! Such as Antiterra and what that encompassed. I'm hoping to give it a reread with these in mind and see how it'll enhance my enjoyment of it
It is very nice to hear your opinion about the book, which I really like. It seems to me that Van and Ada were no longer alive when they wrote this book. Sometimes it seemed that the "voices" of Aqua and Lucetta were heard in the book, although we know that everything is written by Van.
This book is very interesting, I love it!)
Annoying note?: Ada and ardor are homophones (in Russian and Brit. Eng.).
No, they are not bro. It's just Nabokovian wordplay. Ada Ardor Ardis
There is a wonderful audio Pale Fire on RUclips, was anyway, perfectly read and histrionized. I had read PF twice before listening. The audio is perfectly pitched and bafooned!
For the Joycean echo of "pouting pensively, pensively caressing," you may want the end of "The Dead", with its "falling faintly throughout the universe and faintly falling..."
As for Part I of the book being written and annotated during Ada and Van's youth, I'm not convinced. Many of the annotations are in "Ada's late hand"; the strongest textual counterargument is on p.15, with an annotation marked "Marginal jotting in Ada's 1965 hand; crossed out lightly in her latest wavering one."
One thing I wonder about this book (having finished it recently), is really *why* it has been set on Antiterra, and especially why Nabokov choses to ban electricity. (Not why in the novel electricity was banned, but why Nabakov decided to include this element.) Is it just to make Antiterra both real and surreal, like a dream? To enrich the abstract meditations on the nature of Time by deliberately providing a world whose historical time cannot be placed-where, for instance, there are airplanes but no telephones?
The other thing that strikes me about this novel, especially compared with Gravity's Rainbow, is, for all of its hyper-baroque complexity, how *simple* it really is. It's the story of siblings who fall in love and are kept apart by society and family until those families have died. Even Lolita and Pale Fire, even Pnin, doesn't have such a simple story at its core (at least for me).
Thanks for the video!
I always felt like it was a part of Nabokov's point. The way telling is as (or more) important than the thing itself. The story is complex because the way of telling it is. Form and content are one united thing. But I wouldn't say simple, it's ''deceptively simple'' like most of that universe.
My favorite Nabokov. Strange, incestuous, science-fiction (sorta)
Great great explanation just keep it up‼️ And one simple request, Please make the 144p & 240p quality available... Love from India 🇮🇳❤️
Hey, thanks for the comment! I think because I recorded it on a webcam I can't make the earlier videos 144p, but most of the later ones should have lower quality available.
I love this novel also.
I love this book as well. His books are so intricately structured, well written, sensual and weird and dark at the same time. Several of his books flows so easy and smooth they feel like movies, I’m puzzled why they are not adapted more often.
Ada is Nabokov's Finnegans Wake: it exhibits all the vices that Nabokov criticized in Joyce's similarly self-indulgent work. But it remains enthralling.
I really want to read his works. I hear fabulous things of his writing . I don't know why I keep putting him off.
31:39 Sbrit' usï is not latin, its literally russian for what it says in the translation:)
Nice brother...subscribed.
Starts off by pronouncing the title in a way that makes a nonsense of it! That is not encouraging as far as this analysis is concerned.
As an Australian “Ada” and “Ardor” sound exactly the same, probably hence the exaggerative pronunciation. Though I understand the similarity is somewhat the point.