Skipping along to the next set of draft pages for the revised and updated bibliography: Poesie, a set of Italian translations of 30 of Nabokov’s poems was published in March 1962 by Il Saggiatore, an imprint of Mondadori. The Russian and English originals appear on facing pages of the Italian translations. One Russian poem, “Какое сделал я дурное дело. [Kakoe sdelal ia durnoe delo. / What is the evil deed I have committed.]”, appeared here for the first time in book form, therefore making this book an A-item. Alberto Pescetto translated the Russian poems, Enzo Siciliano the English.
Archive for the ‘bibliography’ Category
New Draft Pages: Poesie
Wednesday, June 19th, 2013New Draft Pages: Pale Fire
Thursday, June 13th, 2013Fluttering along to the next set of draft pages for the revised and updated bibliography: Pale Fire, Nabokov’s novel in the apparatus of a poem and its commentary. For many years he had been playing with the elements that became the novel. But it didn’t spring into life until the fall of 1960 and within a year he had finished it. Pale Fire was published by Putnam’s on 7-Apr-1962. It has since gone through 14 further editions including two aimed at collectors.
New Draft Pages: Pnin
Friday, June 7th, 2013Attacking the next set of draft pages for the revised and updated bibliography: Pnin, Nabokov’s fourth novel in English which he began in the late spring of 1953. As he wrote what became seven chapters over the next two years, he submitted them to The New Yorker. The magazine accepted four of them. Because the completed book was less than two-hundred pages long, Nabokov had some trouble finding a publisher for it. Finally Doubleday accepted it and it came out on 7-Mar-1957 to positive reviews and a quick second printing. Since then, it has been through ten further editions in America and Britain.
New Draft Pages: Sebastian Knight
Thursday, May 30th, 2013Charging on to the next set of draft pages for the revised and updated bibliography: The Real Life of Sebastian Night. Begun in Paris in December 1938 before he and his family steamed to America, this was Nabokov’s initial foray into long-form creativity in English. While he was still in Europe, he couldn’t find a publisher for the new novel in England or the U.S. Only when he reached New York was he able, with the help of friends, to place it with the new firm, New Directions. It is A21 in the 1986 bibliography.
The first printing of 1941 was issued in 1941 and 1945 in a variety of bindings and coverings. The details of the two issues and the four variants of the second issue are described.
New Draft Pages: Lectures on Russian Literature
Wednesday, May 22nd, 2013Bearing back, ceaselessly, with a new set of draft pages for the revised and updated bibliography: Lectures on Russian Literature, a compilation of lectures on Russian literature, focusing on six writers. The lectures were edited for publication by Fredson Bowers and copublished in 1981 by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich and Bruccoli Clark. The book has gone through four other editions. It is A53 in the 1986 bibliography.
New Draft Pages: Nabokov’s Butterflies
Wednesday, May 15th, 2013Persisting, we move on to a new set of draft pages for the revised and updated bibliography: Nabokov’s Butterflies is a collection of 415 butterfly artifacts drawn from the three worlds of Nabokov’s life—the scientific, the artistic, and the personal—and displays them where they met and where they interbred. Included, mostly as excerpts, are memoirs, stories, novels, poems, lepidopterological articles, letters, essays, and drawings. This is also the one place in which all of Nabokov’s scientific works on lepidoptera (most in full) are readily available. The volume did not appear in the 1986 bibliography.
New Draft Pages: Sobranie sochineniĭ: III
Thursday, May 9th, 2013Not so dramatically moving along with the next set of draft pages for the revised and updated bibliography: Собрание сочинений: III [Sobranie sochineniĭ: III / Collected works: III] was the third volume in a projected set of Nabokov’s complete Russian works that Ardis began issuing in 1988 or 1989. This volume is an A-item because it included Волшебник [Volshebnik / The enchanter], its first book appearance in its original Russian form. It also included a translation into Russian of Nabokov’s English foreword to The Eye, the novel Соглядатай [Sogliadataĭ / The eye], and a dozen stories. The Enchanter had been previously published in Dmitri Nabokov’s English translation in 1986. The volume did not appear in the 1986 bibliography.
New Draft Pages: P’esy / Plays
Friday, May 3rd, 2013Dramatically moving along with the next set of draft pages for the revised and updated bibliography: Пьесы [P'esy / Plays], a collection of ten works in Russian that included a verse drama, five plays, excerpts from three plays, and a foreword to a play, in translation. It was issued within the Soviet Union in 1990 shortly before its collapse. Four of the works appeared here in book form in full for the first time. The volume did not appear in the 1986 bibliography.
New Draft Pages: Lectures on Literature
Wednesday, April 24th, 2013Reading on with a new set of draft pages for the revised and updated bibliography: Lectures on Literature, a compilation of ten lectures focusing on one masterwork each from seven European writers. The lectures were edited for publication by Fredson Bowers and copublished in 1980 by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich and Bruccoli Clark. The book has gone through four other editions. It is A51 in the 1986 bibliography.
New Draft Pages: Bend Sinister
Wednesday, April 17th, 2013Carrying on to the next set of draft pages for the revised and updated bibliography: Bend Sinister, Nabokov’s second novel in English and the first he wrote in America. Henry Holt published it in 1947. It has gone through ten further editions, most notably the Time Reading Program in 1964 that first included Nabokov’s introduction. It is A24 in the 1986 bibliography.