by Stacy Schiff
137 “I queried him”: Morris Bishop to Alison Bishop, May 18, 1955, Bishop family papers. Interviews with Alison Bishop Jolly, May 20, 1995, Louise Boyle, September 10, 1996, Robert M. Adams, October 13, 1996.
138 Neither author nor publisher: See Girodias, Une journée, II, 297.
139 one’s idiot child: Interview with Robert Langbaum, June 24, 1997.
140 “It’s full of pepper”: VN to DN, April 23, 1957, VNA.
141 shared her fears: Boyd interview with Alison Bishop, April 14, 1983, Boyd archive.
142 same vehemence: Caryn James, “Their Most Regrettable Character,” The New York Times Book Review, May 6, 1984, 34–37.
143 “moral turpitude”: Edmund Wilson to Helen Muchnic, August 18, 1955, in Wilson, Letters on Literature and Politics, 577. The words were most likely Morris Bishop’s. White also remembered that VN worried he would lose his job, 1977 note to file, BMC.
144 “He was happy”: VéN to Berkman, July 5, 1955.
145 Ithaca Public Library: Boyd interview with Alison Bishop, April 14, 1983, Boyd archive.
146 “nostalgic longing”: VéN to Berkman, summer 1955.
147 “which you will need” to “by mail”: VéN to DN, July 1, 1955.
148 “If anyone wants”: Berkman to VéN, June 27, 1955. Also, Boyd interview with Augusta Jaryc, April 14, 1983; Boyd interview with Berkman, April 9, 1983, Boyd archive. Berkman to VéN, October 1, 1954.
149 “has assisted Véra”: VN to Wilson, August 14, 1956, NWL, 300. Negotiated by Véra, the contract was between Doubleday and Dmitri.
150 “I have finished”: VN to H. Levin, September 14, 1956, Houghton.
151 “Last year”: VéN to Amy Kelly, September 18, 1956.
152 “We have just”: VéN to Elena Levin, June 24, 1956, PC.
153 “Instead of taking”: VéN to DN, June 8, 1956.
154 “each of which is really”: VN to Natalia Peterson, December 18, 1955.
155 stimulating effect: Wilson to Muchnic, in Wilson, Letters on Literature and Politics, August 18, 1955. Cf. the account of a later visit, Upstate, 159. Wilson remained flabbergasted that Vladimir considered LO his best book in any language, Wilson to Struve, June 21, 1957.
156 Wilson happily confided: Wilson to Grynberg, September 28, 1955, LOC. “I was glad to have an opportunity to renew my good relations with him and get to like him again” were the actual words.
157 “My mistake”: VéN copy of Harry Levin, Memories of the Moderns (New York: New Directions, 1980), 215, VNA.
158 “The only thing”: VéN to Berkman, summer 1955.
159 “As one of us”: Epstein to VN, July 13, 1956.
160 “Sheer unrestrained pornography”: John Gordon, The Sunday Express, January 29, 1956.
161 He had himself: Edward de Grazia, Girls Lean Back Everywhere (New York: Random House, 1992), 257. De Grazia’s is an eminently lucid guide to the publishing difficulties surrounding LO, among other volumes.
162 “lewd and libertine”: VN to Covici, March 29, 1956, SL, 185.
163 “V & V Inc.”: VéN to DN, March 30, 1967, VNA.
164 lovely cottage: Alison Bishop had located the rental, though she worried it might be too isolated for the Nabokovs. “No fear of solitude; the only question is whether food is obtainable in Mt. Carmel. Véra doesn’t want to live on canned goods,” Morris Bishop advised his wife. Bishop to Alison Bishop, May 14, 1955, Cornell.
165 “Another busy” to “three months”: VéN to Kelly, September 18, 1956.
166 washing machine repairman: Boyd interview with VéN, January 9, 1985, Boyd archive.
167 “Since he is working”: VéN to HS, December 31, 1956.
168 “Yes, of course”: VéN to HS, February 28, 1957.
169 she grumbled: VéN to HS, February 11, 1958.
170 “a lovely row”: VéN to Berkman, February 20, 1957.
171 “How persistently”: PF, 79.
172 “loves to lose”: Bishop, cited in Michael Scammell unpublished pages, PC.
173 The Anchor Review: The excerpt was chosen in consultation with Doubleday’s lawyers. VN and VéN were thrilled with the presentation.
174 about little girls: Interview with Barbara Epstein, September 17, 1996. See also Tom Turley, Niagara Falls Gazette, January 11, 1959. At the same time a very proper German academic, Dr. Frederick Kohner, wrote a novel about a teenage girl that America embraced as wholesome and amusing. To capture the patois of the bikini-and-bobby-sox set for Gidget (1958), he eavesdropped on his daughter’s phone conversations, taking notes from the extension in the kitchen.
175 neat carbonic tribute: VéN to Doubleday, March 31/April 1, 1957.
176 “I wonder if you”: VéN to Epstein, January 16, 1957.
177 “albino camels”: VN to White, April 4, 1957, SL, 216.
178 Véra heard only: VéN to HS, February 11, 1958.
179 Siamese cat: Interview with Ruth Sharp, January 23, 1998.
180 mouse-tennis and “Do you think”: Doris Nagel to parents, February 27, 1957, PC.
181 distasteful subject: See for example William James to VN, June 22, 1956.
182 fretted over the subject: Interview with Alison Jolly, May 20, 1995; Jolly to author, November 6, 1996.
183 “I would not like”: Szeftel, Cornell Magazine, November 1980.
184 on Pnin and Szeftel: See Galya Diment, Pniniad. Also Boyd interview with Appel, April 23, 1983, Boyd archive. Field, 1986, 29.
185 Even Mrs. Szeftel: Interview with Kitty Szeftel, August 15, 1996.
186 “Nabokov’s Pnin”: Bishop to Alison Bishop, April 28, 1957, cited in Diment, Pniniad, 63.
187 “Oh, well, every Russian”: Parry, The Texas Quarterly, Spring 1971.
188 “Lolita is young”: VN to Epstein, March 5, 1957.
189 Having robbed a bank: Ken McCormick note to Doubleday files, LOC.
190 She was startled, and “repulsive”: Interview with Maria Leiper, February 8, 1998.
191 shunning Lolita: James, The New York Times Book Review, May 6, 1984.
192 reselling copies: A little bookstore in Ithaca obtained a few copies, marked them $10 each, and sold them out in the course of a half hour. VéN to Ergaz, September 10, 1957.
193 tempted to publish privately: William Styron, “The Book on Lolita,” The New Yorker, September 4, 1995, 33.
194 “revolted to the point”: Hiram Haydn, Words and Faces (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1974), 264–66. None of Nabokov’s other works went over any better with Haydn, who never made it past page 22 of Pale Fire and had the decency to admit as much.
195 devoted nearly as much: Time, March 18, 1957.
196 twilight games: VN to Hessen, April 22, 1957. It was also the house in which VN read his way through the resident anthropologist’s personal library. Interview with Ruth Sharp.
197 “Well then, if that”: VéN to Goldenweiser, June 3, 1957, Bakhm.
198 “The question of” to “your man”: VéN to Houghton Mifflin, July 24, 1952. The editor happened to be Wilson’s daughter, Rosalind.
199 “nightly roamings” and “I have finally”: VéN to Chekhov Publishing, January 28, 1953.
200 “about those magic”: GIFT, 110.
201 “is as sketchy”: VéN to Edgar S. Pitkin, February 13, 1959.
202 more gently suggested: VéN to Robert Sigman, November 29, 1957, VNA.
203 “On August 6 of that year”: SO, 270.
204 “Allow me to clear up”: VéN to Mrs. Sherwood, June 30, 1969.
205 “I have no way”: VN to Michael Mohrt, Gallimard, c. 1959.
206 “Personally I would appreciate”: VéN to Prins & Prins, April 10, 1968.
207 “He simply does not”: VéN to HS, November 20, 1952.
208 “a bad letter-writer”: VéN to Berkman, October 25, 1962.
209 “fiercely protective”: VéN copy of Alan Levy, The Velvet Butterfly, 13.
210 a sensational, book: VéN to Irving Lazar, September 9, 1968, VNA.
212 “your talented boy friend’s”: Lamont to VéN, November 4, 1952.
213 “In doing so”: VéN to Lamont, November 22, 1952.
214 “V. was asked” to “push now”: VéN to Berkman, October 10, 1956, SL, 188–89.
215 “I’m sorry” and “repeat it”: VéN to HS, April 9, 1959.
216 “Dear V. & V.” to “at will”: Bishop to the Nabokovs, April 17, 1959.
217 “My husband asks”: VéN to Jack Dalton, October 15, 1963, SL, 350.
218 The situation was complicated: Interviews with Walter Minton, June 5, 1995; Ivan Obolensky, May 31, 1996.
219 “Vladimir started this letter”: VéN to Epstein, December 22, 1957.
220 “space spooks”: LO, 235.
221 instantly forgot: VN to Frank Taylor, McGraw-Hill, December 13, 1969.
222 “V hates the telephone”: VéN diary, VNA.
223 “communicatory neurosis”: VéN to William Maxwell, January 16, 1964.
224 conferred with her: Interview with Obolensky, May 31, 1996.
225 “making one last appeal”: Minton to VN, December 27, 1957.
226 “I just lied my head”: Interview with Minton, June 5, 1995.
227 Véra was to blame: Minton to Girodias, November 29, 1958, cited in Girodias, “Lolita, Nabokov, and I,” Evergreen, September 1965, 47.
228 “Mama is angry”: VN to DN, December 3, 1959, VNA.
229 “beneath the word”: PF, 68.
7 PAST PERFECT
1 “Long distance” to “handling the MS” and all subsequent diary entries: VéN 1958 diary, VNA.
2 “Should they send”: VN to Levin, May 22, 1958.
3 “The very thought”: VéN to Agnes Perkins, April 29, 1958.
4 “Some days I barely”: Eric Kahane to VN, February 2, 1958.
5 “That’s a beautiful” to “Alcatraz,” Gallimard’s low expectations: Interview with Kahane, June 12, 1996.
6 “in the advance light”: LATH, 6.
7 “finally giving”: VéN diary, VNA.
8 “He is wildly”: Brenner, The New Republic, June 23, 1958, 18–21.
9 master of the perverse: The word “perverse” had a habit of attaching itself to the work. When finally she read and failed to admire the novel, White begged Nabokov: “Please try to forgive my perversity on your perversity.” Brenner offered: “Perverse. Of all the words one should employ to tag Nabokov’s art, this now seems to me by far the most accurate.” He was astute enough to apply the adjective equally to the earlier works and sophisticated enough to recognize it as a virtue. Two months later, Orville Prescott, Lolita’s most visible non-admirer, wrote in The New York Times: “To describe such a perversion with the pervert’s enthusiasm without being disgusting is impossible.” Doussia Ergaz used the same word in pitching the novel to Girodias.
10 vowed to write: VéN to Kelly, February 7, 1960. VN told Italian journalists as much as well.
11 It is unlikely: Boyd concurs, interview of November 21, 1996.
12 she boasted: VéN to Filippa Rolf, September 25, 1958.
13 “is really a very childish”: Unpublished interview with Phyllis Méras, May 13, 1962.
14 Humbert’s motel rooms: She found motor courts tolerable, motels less so.
15 coming-out party: VéN to Berkman, August 25, 1958.
16 “What is it?” to “It’s the main”: The New York Post, August 6, 1958, 10.
17 Lionel Trilling met: Diana Trilling to author, September 13, 1995.
18 “serenely indifferent”: VéN diary, VNA.
19 “highbrow pornography”: Prescott, The New York Times, August 18, 1958.
20 “vicious spite”: VéN diary, VNA. Prescott was not the only one to balk at VN’s memory; Katharine White’s colleagues at The New Yorker were convinced he was inventing details in 1948, when the magazine rejected an early section of his memoirs. White to VN, September 6, 1948, BMC.
21 “in a subtle”: VéN to Berkman, August 25, 1958.
22 “It will apparently”: VéN to HS, October 12, 1958, PC.
23 the Life team: Interviews with Carl Mydans, March 24, 1998, Betty Ajemian, April 5, 1998.
24 “They are both”: Mydans diary, PC.
25 “in front of” to “moderately good book”: VéN diary, VNA.
26 No day passed: VéN to HS, December 8, 1958, PC.
27 Harry and Kuvyrkin, Harris and Kubrick: VéN diary, VNA.
28 Mormon boy: Melvin A. Nimer, Jr., age 8, asserted he had killed both parents.
29 utterly corrupt: The New York Times Book Review, October 26, 1958, 2.
30 “having struck oil”: Arthur Mizener to VN, October 11, 1958.
31 the Women’s Club conversation: VéN diary, VNA.
32 press clippings: She also compiled a “not-for-file” file, of the related but off-color clippings, the bra ads, the personals. The non-file expanded greatly with Ada’s publication.
33 “network roulette”: PF, 49.
34 the television routines, “They all hope”: VéN diary, VNA.
35 tongues did cluck: Interviews with Peter Czap; Roberta Silman; Barton Friedman, July 1996. I have relied here on David Slavitt’s recollections of his Newsweek interview, posted on NABOKV-L, July 10, 1994. See also Newsweek, November 24, 1958, 114.
36 “They seem disappointed”: VéN diary, VNA.
37 “The book in question”: Malott to C. B. Kelley, January 27, 1959, Cornell. See also, Bishop, in Appel and Newman, eds., Nabokov, 238.
38 Strange Fruit: VéN to Barbetti, May 13, 1947.
39 “Now, didn’t we”: Interview with Ellis Duell, September 12, 1997. Similarly, Jean-Jacques Demorest.
40 producing them on demand: Interview with Albert Podell, October 21, 1996. Similarly, Keegan, January 15, 1998.
41 “a correction which is”: VéN to The New York Post, August 22, 1958.
42 “the rich pre-revolutionary”: Evening Standard (London), November 5, 1959.
43 excitement over the countdown: VéN diary, VNA. VéN to HS, December 8, 1958. VéN to Jason Epstein, December 7, 1958.
44 “ready-made souls”: CBC, November 26, 1958, interview with Pierre Bertin.
45 “Lolita was attacked”: The New York Post, August 31, 1958.
46 she fixed instead: Syracuse Post-Standard, September 14, 1958; VéN diary, VNA; Szeftel, Cornell Magazine, November 1980.
47 Lolita discussed: Hazel’s suicide struck her as one of the most affecting passages in all of her husband’s work. To Filippa Rolf, March 22, 1966.
48 “the fading smile”: F. W. Dupee, “Lolita in America,” Columbia University Forum, Winter 1959, 39.
49 “sat with me one night”: Minton to author, August 12, 1995.
50 “petite grue”: VéN diary, VNA. See also Girodias, Une journée, II, 429–30, and L’Express, January 8, 1959.
51 Six days before: VéN to Goldenweiser, August 12, 1958, Bakhm.
52 could no longer cope: VéN to Elena Levin, October 30, 1958, PC.
53 “We are swamped”: VéN to Berkman, November 30, 1958.
54 the Minton call, the Lehigh student: VéN diary, VNA.
55 “I am swamped”: VéN to Lena Massalsky, January 1959, VNA.
56 another fifty years: VéN to Berkman, April 19, 1961.
57 to extort money: VéN to Jason Epstein, January 18, 1958.
58 “V. got so bored” through “put back”: VéN diary, VNA.
59 “Yes, a new tax”: Walter Winchell, New York Mirror, October 14, 1962. Also, John Coleman, The Spectator (London), November 3, 1959.
60 Suspicious Véra: Girodias, Une journée, II, 455.
61 “Yes, I know”: Cited in Diment, Pniniad, 134.
62 “business manager, chauffeuse”: Jeffrey Blyth The Daily Mail (London), March 16, 1959 (first of a two-part article).
63 could not have asked: Interview with Marie Schebeko Biche, February 10, 1997.
&nb
sp; 64 crossbreeding her Russian: Arts (Paris), November 3, 1959.
65 learn two things: Rolf to Tenggren, January 21, 1961, PC. “January,” 29, PC.
66 “by a real Swede”: VéN to Lena Massalsky, April 12, 1959.
67 “Ignition was made”: B. B. Ribbing to Mina Turner, Doubleday, July 9, 1959. In all some four thousand Lolitas and two thousand Pnins went up in smoke. The Wahlström relationship had got off to an awkward start. Having published Camera Obscura many years earlier, the firm did not discover that Sirin and Nabokov were one and the same until six months after they had acquired LO.
68 “charming”: VéN to Pyke Johnson, Jr., Doubleday, July 20, 1959.
69 a great joy: Interview with Dorothy Gilbert, March 29, 1996.
70 Lewis Nichols: The New York Times Book Review, August 31, 1958.
71 “We have been running”: VéN to Mrs. J. P. Ashmore, March 25, 1959, VNA.
72 to Wilson’s mind: Wilson to Grynberg, August 23, 1958, LOC.
73 “Really do read it!”: Grynberg to VN, probably January 19, 1958.
74 “I am reading DR.”: VN to Epstein, August 26, 1958. Max Hayward: See Patricia Blake introduction to Max Hayward, Writers in Russia 1917–78.
75 “It’s a good translation”: Blyth, The Daily Mail (London), March 17, 1959.
76 “The Zhivago gang”: VN to Minton, May 18, 1959.
77 “The communists”: VéN diary, VNA.
78 “sorry thing, clumsy”: Niagara Falls Gazette, January 11, 1959.
79 Pasternak’s mistress: VéN to David Slavitt, to Filippa Rolf. A decade later: SO, 206. See also Szeftel, Cornell Magazine, November 1980; Russkaya Mysl, February 7, 1961.
80 “although she’ll probably”: VéN to Elena Levin, October 30, 1958, PC.
81 “behaving rather badly”: Wilson to Grynberg, November 1, 1958, LOC. The phrase was indecipherable to me but not to Lewis Dabney.
82 “Compared to Pasternak”: Alan Nordstrom, Ivy Magazine (New Haven), February 1959, 28.
83 felt Nabokov was thumbing: Interview with Mrs. Orval French, May 3, 1996.
84 “Have you read Pnin”: Interview with Dorothy Gilbert, March 15, 1996.
85 “the saint and the”: Szeftel, Cornell Magazine, November 1980.