Some notes on Nabakov and truth
I am repeatedly drawn to Nabakov because of his views and responses to critics more than to his literature, which I find interesting and compelling but not as much so as what he says outside of his fiction. In his Paris Review Interview, The Art of Fiction, 1967, http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/4310/the-art-of-fiction-no-40-vladimir-nabokov, Nabakov repeatedly calls into question many "problems" readers bring to texts:
Is the writer "in" the text?
Can we infer ideas, emotions, views of the writer from a fictional text?
Why do we do that?
Is the main character somehow a stand in for the author?
Of course, the answers to these questions vary by author and book, but the questions remind us of how readerly literature is. How trapped in our own prism/prison our interpretations are, regardless of who the writer is or what the text is. This becomes especially true when we read something for the second or third time and realize how different this reading is. The text has remained the same but we have changed.
Nabakov says there is no "everyday reality", which seems pretty obvious. There isn't. But yet, we talk as if there is. Is there in a sense that really is not everyday reality? I mean is there something else that we are talking about when we use that language? How do we talk about books in a bookgroup if there isn't some shared experience that we are all (or at least most of us) referencing? There must be a shared experience even if it isn't an "everyday" reality or else how would books be so interesting to so many? So, is a better question, how is some shared reality different from others? It's kind of like a venn diagram where we all overlap and that tiny place where the overlaps come together is the shared part and the entire rest of the experience is not shared.
Is this also the nature of truth?
I'm reading "The Good Soldier" by Ford Maddox Ford, which is clearly focused on issues of "impression" and truth" and kind of how we live on this line where on one side of the line is "the truth" and on the other is the "abyss", and somehow we have to keep in that middle place. Or maybe it's better to think of it as on one side of the line is truth, the abyss, and on the other side is perception and you can't ever really let your perception go over the line into the truth because it's so horrifying. Or is that just our perception that the truth is so horrifying? When, in fact, for most of us, it's not particularly interesting one way or the other. It just is the human endeavor. The abyss represents a kind of moral hole that if we were to acknowledge we've ventured into would demand that we cannot return. But that's simply a perception of breaking our moral code. We all do it pretty regularly but its horrifying to acknowledge it so we create these elaborate mental structures to reframe what we've done, or we go mad, or get depressed, or kill ourselves. But are there some people that live in the "truth" and find it, if not comfortable, at least okay?
Nabakov says of Humbert Humbert, he "is a vain and cruel wretch who manages to appear 'touching'. Which seems an apt description of Ashburnham and maybe many of us at different times because we act out of individualistic motives to assuage some overwhelming feeling we have--we lose our impulse control in a way that is unacceptable (all of us lose our impulse control, it's just some of us do it in morally acceptable ways--tackle someone on a football field, write erudite letters to the editor, call in sick when we are well)j. The struggle in Ford is dramatically different than that in Lolita, however. Humbert does not care about the immorality of his actions and he makes no attempt to make sense of them. Whereas, Ford's book is a study in trying to find some way to make sense out of conflicting values and desires and views of oneself. Do those who find Ford's book a "great book" tend to be those who can understand the struggle that Dowells goes through and find the mire and mess of the Ashburhams and the somehow familiar? Does Lolita resonate for entirely different reasons? It's hard not to see the two different portrayals of a similar type a reflection of the author himself.
Nabakov uses the term "poshlost" to describe writing that has is "social comment, humanistic messages, political allegories, overconcern with class or race" among other things. And he uses the term very derogatorily (if that's even a word). What kind of messages would be the opposite of "Humanistic" ones? I do disagree with N here. I don't think the subject matter necessarily has anything to do with the quality of the writing--not sure if I mean that . . . But, I think A Good Soldier is definitely a social commentary and not "poshlost". It is melodramatic and it does attempt to dig into the individual's thought and emotions and insight or lack thereof,which seems humanistic. Lolita seems to suggest these things (motives, causes, emotions) do not matter. When we read of Humbert we read of a person who does not belong in society and it doesn't really matter why (and maybe can't be known anyway). With Ashburham, Ford is making attempts to help us understand him and how he fits in his society. . .
Is the writer "in" the text?
Can we infer ideas, emotions, views of the writer from a fictional text?
Why do we do that?
Is the main character somehow a stand in for the author?
Of course, the answers to these questions vary by author and book, but the questions remind us of how readerly literature is. How trapped in our own prism/prison our interpretations are, regardless of who the writer is or what the text is. This becomes especially true when we read something for the second or third time and realize how different this reading is. The text has remained the same but we have changed.
Nabakov says there is no "everyday reality", which seems pretty obvious. There isn't. But yet, we talk as if there is. Is there in a sense that really is not everyday reality? I mean is there something else that we are talking about when we use that language? How do we talk about books in a bookgroup if there isn't some shared experience that we are all (or at least most of us) referencing? There must be a shared experience even if it isn't an "everyday" reality or else how would books be so interesting to so many? So, is a better question, how is some shared reality different from others? It's kind of like a venn diagram where we all overlap and that tiny place where the overlaps come together is the shared part and the entire rest of the experience is not shared.
Is this also the nature of truth?
I'm reading "The Good Soldier" by Ford Maddox Ford, which is clearly focused on issues of "impression" and truth" and kind of how we live on this line where on one side of the line is "the truth" and on the other is the "abyss", and somehow we have to keep in that middle place. Or maybe it's better to think of it as on one side of the line is truth, the abyss, and on the other side is perception and you can't ever really let your perception go over the line into the truth because it's so horrifying. Or is that just our perception that the truth is so horrifying? When, in fact, for most of us, it's not particularly interesting one way or the other. It just is the human endeavor. The abyss represents a kind of moral hole that if we were to acknowledge we've ventured into would demand that we cannot return. But that's simply a perception of breaking our moral code. We all do it pretty regularly but its horrifying to acknowledge it so we create these elaborate mental structures to reframe what we've done, or we go mad, or get depressed, or kill ourselves. But are there some people that live in the "truth" and find it, if not comfortable, at least okay?
Nabakov says of Humbert Humbert, he "is a vain and cruel wretch who manages to appear 'touching'. Which seems an apt description of Ashburnham and maybe many of us at different times because we act out of individualistic motives to assuage some overwhelming feeling we have--we lose our impulse control in a way that is unacceptable (all of us lose our impulse control, it's just some of us do it in morally acceptable ways--tackle someone on a football field, write erudite letters to the editor, call in sick when we are well)j. The struggle in Ford is dramatically different than that in Lolita, however. Humbert does not care about the immorality of his actions and he makes no attempt to make sense of them. Whereas, Ford's book is a study in trying to find some way to make sense out of conflicting values and desires and views of oneself. Do those who find Ford's book a "great book" tend to be those who can understand the struggle that Dowells goes through and find the mire and mess of the Ashburhams and the somehow familiar? Does Lolita resonate for entirely different reasons? It's hard not to see the two different portrayals of a similar type a reflection of the author himself.
Nabakov uses the term "poshlost" to describe writing that has is "social comment, humanistic messages, political allegories, overconcern with class or race" among other things. And he uses the term very derogatorily (if that's even a word). What kind of messages would be the opposite of "Humanistic" ones? I do disagree with N here. I don't think the subject matter necessarily has anything to do with the quality of the writing--not sure if I mean that . . . But, I think A Good Soldier is definitely a social commentary and not "poshlost". It is melodramatic and it does attempt to dig into the individual's thought and emotions and insight or lack thereof,which seems humanistic. Lolita seems to suggest these things (motives, causes, emotions) do not matter. When we read of Humbert we read of a person who does not belong in society and it doesn't really matter why (and maybe can't be known anyway). With Ashburham, Ford is making attempts to help us understand him and how he fits in his society. . .
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