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jesssalexander 's review for:
Pnin
by Vladimir Nabokov
What a drastic contrast between this novel and Lolita! Reading the two books close together gives some good insight to Nabokov's prowess as a writer and character builder. Where Humbert is vile, conniving, and arrogant, Timofey Pnin is sweet, endearing, quixotic. I was utterly charmed by Pnin and really cared about him! Like when Pnin is washing the dishes and drops the nutcracker into the sink and you think it is the punch bowl-- I gasped outloud and almost cried. And then felt such relief when it was just the goblet. There are few characters I've ever been this emotionally invested in. Here are some of my favorite snapshots that illustrate who he is:
-when as a child he has a "tussle with the wallpaper" during a fever and cannot fall asleep because he is so plagued by the incomprehensibility of the patterned design
-when he stops pondering the mechanisms of the universe to help a haughty and unappreciative squirrel-- who is eerily similar to his ex-wife-- drink from a water fountain
-when his landlady tries to help him understand a magazine comic to cheer him up and he assumes the speech bubbles are depictions of atomic bomb explosions
-when he delightfully plods away in the library on his research, wearing rubber gloves to avoid the static of metal files and nearly crumbled in despair when he realizes he left an index card of notes in a 2500 page volume-- thinking he must meticulously comb the book page by page-- until a kind soul comes by, up-ends the book, and shakes the index card out.
Pnin is heroically selfless, oblivious and optimistic. I think he is so refreshing as a character because he doesn't think the world owes him anything and he is purely kind. He says at one point "Is sorrow not, one asks, the only thing in the world people really possess?" I felt protective of this sweet soul and disdainful of the many characters that misuse him, snicker at him, and walk all over him. It is obvious that Nabokov wrote him lovingly and with serious fondness.
The writing is just so impressive and effortlessly gorgeous. This guy was a genius. I can't think of anyone else that writes so beautifully in their mother tongue as well as in another language. And who else can describe a mechanical pencil sharpener with such dazzling poetry?! And I quote:
"That highly satisfying, highly philosophical implement that goes ticonderoga-ticonderoga, feeding on the yellow finish and sweet wood, and ends up in a kind of soundlessly spinning ethereal void as we all must."
This book is a masterpiece.
-when as a child he has a "tussle with the wallpaper" during a fever and cannot fall asleep because he is so plagued by the incomprehensibility of the patterned design
-when he stops pondering the mechanisms of the universe to help a haughty and unappreciative squirrel-- who is eerily similar to his ex-wife-- drink from a water fountain
-when his landlady tries to help him understand a magazine comic to cheer him up and he assumes the speech bubbles are depictions of atomic bomb explosions
-when he delightfully plods away in the library on his research, wearing rubber gloves to avoid the static of metal files and nearly crumbled in despair when he realizes he left an index card of notes in a 2500 page volume-- thinking he must meticulously comb the book page by page-- until a kind soul comes by, up-ends the book, and shakes the index card out.
Pnin is heroically selfless, oblivious and optimistic. I think he is so refreshing as a character because he doesn't think the world owes him anything and he is purely kind. He says at one point "Is sorrow not, one asks, the only thing in the world people really possess?" I felt protective of this sweet soul and disdainful of the many characters that misuse him, snicker at him, and walk all over him. It is obvious that Nabokov wrote him lovingly and with serious fondness.
The writing is just so impressive and effortlessly gorgeous. This guy was a genius. I can't think of anyone else that writes so beautifully in their mother tongue as well as in another language. And who else can describe a mechanical pencil sharpener with such dazzling poetry?! And I quote:
"That highly satisfying, highly philosophical implement that goes ticonderoga-ticonderoga, feeding on the yellow finish and sweet wood, and ends up in a kind of soundlessly spinning ethereal void as we all must."
This book is a masterpiece.