Oh, there is no fanatic like a convert. And Nabokov's writing in the English language bestows his found tongue with rapture. This is Nabokov's finest (I suppose in this 21st century, I just don't find Lolita shocking! shocking! the way its rookie readers must have) and one of the top ten novels of the 20th century.

Surprisingly, you'll find that this book composed of a 999-line poem and the commentary written on that poem by a colleague, has a plot. It is ingenious, twisted, brilliant. One of the most finely crafted works of art ever. I've picked up the word "replete" in relation to art from Steven Pinker, and this work is repleteful. The words, the language, the structure, the social criticism, and most of all, the beauty, as I contemplate and re-contemplate this work, grow ever more replete.

I love this poem. "I was the shadow of the waxwing slain/ In the false azure of the windowpane" and its delicate rhymes and trips and footfalls are savored with every single re-reading. He brings an outsiders perspective to the language with rhymes we don't "see" but hear: "Come and be worshipped, come and be caressed / My dark Vanessa, crimson-barred, my blest" and it sometimes feels like he's introducing you to a new English language.

So who wouldn't like this book, I suppose, should be a question the reviewer should try to answer. Well, I just can't imagine anybody that's ever bought a novel not liking this one, so I suppose if you're a pure non-fiction reader, this ain't for you. And Nabokov is a bit bloodless at times, you won't find the wild, sloppy joy of a Kerouac, or the brawny aggressiveness of a Hemingway, but finely finely crafted and turned and polished words delivered impeccably, perfectly.

Please, please, read Pale Fire. The more of us that carry Nabokov's masterwork in our hearts, the more he will have "lived on, flew on, in the reflected sky"

Pale Fire is essentially a mystery story. It presents facts and the testimony of a deranged man, and allows the reader to do the detective work. The task presented the reader is daunting as the plots, subplots, and character sketches twist in ever tightening involutions, levels of complexity stacking one on top of another. Nabokov is kind though. Ever conscious of the novel as entertainment he allows the proccess to be fun. He gives away many of the mysteries in ways that lead the reader to believe that he or she has made the discovery. He also leaves some that are so complicated that it would take multiple rereads (or a good companion reader) to make the discoveries. This book is without a doubt my favorite of Nabokov's works, and there are few that I would not recommend it to. My only warning is that you will get out of this book exactly what you put in it. If you read straight through and put it down, you will only scratch the suface of what this novel offers and intends. Though even this will eb an enjoyable experience. The more time you invest and the more you investigate, the richer the experiece will be, and in my opinion, the more fun you will have. Pale Fire is a beautiful and entrancing puzzle capable of almost infinite entertainment.

Nabokov's strength always lay in creating "mirror worlds" to our own; those mysterious counterparts in which resided our hopes, a little beauty, and danger.

His images are striking and evocative of the mirror world. It may not have been in this book, but I remember one image in particular: someone observes, from a bridge across a small pond in the park, a leaf falling into the crystal placid calm of the pond, rushing to meet its etheric double somewhere in between the two worlds of "real" and "mirror".

In "Pale Fire", Kinbote's land of Zembla is the mirror-world. And it isn't so much that this mirror world "exists" in the world, but that Nabokov makes it a part of our world through Shade's poem, Kinbote's fantastic stories, and in Kinbote's (our) yearning to find another world in books.

This is a brilliant explication of those forces which Nabokov saw in the literary world. Satisfyingly post-modern, hilariously contrived, and with a structure that seems to accomodate perfectly Nabokov's themes, "Pale Fire", I think, proves his old adage that, "Beauty plus pity, that is the closest definition we can have of art."

Post Script:
Some have suggested that Shade's daughter is the real focus of the story, by virtue of the fact that she is passed over, swallowed up. I don't know, but it just goes to show that any reading of this book will be a rewarding one. Keep it on your bedside table.

Vladimir Nabokov, Laughter in the Dark (Berkeley,
1938)

Laughter in the Dark was Nabokov's first treading of
the ground he would return to almost twenty years
later in Lolita-- a middle-aged man finds himself
desperately desiring an underage nymphet coming off
her first love affair, and complications ensue.

This may have been Nabokov's fifth novel (originally
published in Russia in 1932), but it has earmarks of
first-novel syndrome. He returns in some small part to
his subject matter in Mary (the renewal of the old
relationship amidst the new one) while seeing what
could be gotten from the then-shocking subject matter
of age differences in relationships. Unfortunately,
both Mary and Lolita are better-fleshed-out than this.
While it does pick up towards the end (the last third
of the book or so is right up there with some of
Nabokov's better work as far as sheer readability
goes), you may well be better off grabbing those and
reading them back to back.

In the interests of amusement, note that the main
character (whose name is Albinus Kretchmer)'s new love
is said to have figured out his real name by checking
under R in a telephone directory. I'm still trying to
figure that one out.

For Nabokov completists only. ** 1/2

My favorite book by Nabokov; it has much to do with two of Nabokov's favorite subjects: passion and sences. The author's celebrated diction is as excuisite as ever in this book; his novels should be read for the prose alone. Although the subject matter in the book may appear to be trivial, Nabokov covers it in such intricate, unique detail that the palate of sences that this novel arises is burging on overloading one's nervious system. An absolute gem of a book!

I do not know if Nabokov meant this tightly written and wonderfully plotted noir to be a cautionary tale about adultery, but I do think that any married man who reads _Laughter in the Dark_ might think twice before starting an affair with a much younger woman. This book is a cross between _Lolita_, _Crime and Punishment_, with a sprinkling of "Double Indemnity," and is quite simply the best soap opera I have ever read.

Albert Albinus is a married, successful art critic who meets and falls in love with a young, attractive, but low class girl who is an aspiring, but no talent actress. She cuckolds Albinus with a colleague of his who is also a deceitful and amoral opportunist. Together they victimize Albinus in one of the cruelist and most sickening ways I have ever read. Albinus' foolish sin begins with and eventually ends in tragedy. If I may loosely quote Ford Maddox Ford's _The Good Soldier_, "this is one of the saddest stories I have ever heard."

This novel is a good first effort, with vivid characters and a bìt of a surprise ending, which is one of Nab's trademarks. While I would never have read it for itself alone, it is interesting to see how a genius began in a new medium.

Putting my obsession for Nabokov and for first novels in general aside, reading this was still pure bliss. Sometimes narrative breaks for the author to sneak in some philosophical musing about memory, but somehow it fits. Immature writer syndrome, I suppose, which i've caught in my own work.

It is a book about first love, and losing her, and then finding her again, but engaged to another man, who's not half the man you are. Nabokov questions how much you're in love with only the memory, and whether finding the flesh and blood girl again will ever fill the hole that your memory and desire have dug.

Makes interesting reading next to Martin Amis' first work, The Rachel Papers.

Though I found this book in some pasages quite boring none the less I liked it very much ganin is a great character easy to hate for alot of reasons but mainly the guy like most of us lives in the past trying all his life to recapture a moment he thinks was the greatest and happiest moment of his life in the hopes of living it again in this case with mary the love of his life...but ofcorse sadly for all of us that can never happen again I dont think there are hollywood endings in the stories of nabkov just realistic ones...but still what a great ending an ending that confirmed the idea I had all through the book that some sort of awakening has to happen in his life and realization that the past no matter how beautiful it was can never be resurrected except in our memories and the reality of his dull,poor and ugly life is still a reality.But I think as ganin realised in the end that other maries waiting to be loved happier moments waiting to be lived can still exits in the future.

Speak, Memory: An Autobiography Revisited written by Vladimir Nabokov is a rather enchanting, but poetic book about the author's early life. A recollection of his youthful years remembering is father as more liberal-minded and his mother as he describes her as very beautiful.

The author takes on a trip though time, a time soon to be shattered by the Soviet dictatorship. The author writes in a style that commands the English language, but with a foreign taste, making for an interesting read. The author's choice and usage of words will challange you so, be prepared to with a good dictionary and the meaning may be the secord or third usage.

The life style in St. Petersburg and the surrounding countryside are recalled by the author in a writing style wholly his own as he uses all the powers of an excellent writer to convey this intensely human, yet cultured story.

The book has splendid country estates, nostalgia, lost childhood and paint a rather unique picture of a loving family suddenly torn from peace to terror of the Bolshevik Revolution. We are taken on a tour de force through England for education, An emigre life in Paris and Berlin.

But most of all the book is a work of nostalgia and lost childhood written with a unique style by a master stylist of the English language.

Nabakov is indisputably one on of the greatest prose-stylists of the 20th century. Nabokov utilizes his full range of writing tricks, styles, and poetics to describe his life in "Speak, memory."

Nabakov describes his youth in a spiral like fashion. Ironically, yet vividly, he emphasizes a lot on the little and seemingly insignificant things that we remember, despite being well traveled and cultured. Such as the first pen, crazy stewards, and annoying college room mates.

However, this ain't a book to read in the bathtub, folks! Equip yourself with a dictionary. Otherwise, you may drown! It will take you a while, maybe the first fifty pages to get the hang of his writing. It has a foreign tune to it with very complex words. If you are patient then you will savor his dreamy-like way with words.

However, a reader may be offended by Nabakov's personality reflected by "Speak, memory ". He is arrogant, pampered, and unstable. He never ever talked of the peasants before or during the Russian Revolution. He even hardly scratches the surface of his long stay and experience in America. It's hard to tell if he eschews events and feelings that are too foreign or offensive to him.

Obviously, it may be hard to hold his hand when one examines his stubborn attitude and the way he thinks. ( Look at the reviews above ) But for literary aesthetes, one can hold his hand when cherishing his elegant, dreamy, rich, complex, insights and use of language.

I have spent the summer drowning in Nabokovian puddles, but this autobiography is the least satisfactory yet. On the plus side it (naturally) contains some of the most beautiful sentences I've ever read. The seamless flow from concrete detail, scrupulous description, misty nostalgia to philosophical speculation is dizzying and inspired. The chapter on the author's mother is quite possibly the most gorgeous piece of writing in the language, but my favorite is the melancholy portrait of his uncle, a fascinating, loveable, moving character who might have enriched a novel. The battle between the natural and the human worlds are convincingly balanced, with history swooping in for final victory.

And yet Speak, Memory is fundamentally dislikeable. The tone grates: imagine a whole book written in the style of Nabokov's forewards - arrogant, didactic, humorless. That's what nearly kills it - the lack of Nabokovian playfulness. There are a couple of real-life events that are so shocking that they verge on farce, but in general the tone is reverent and uncritical, and the madness of Nabokov's greatest narrators has no place here.

The young Nabokov is thoroughly dislikeable (but then so is the Nab of the forewards), 'something of a bully' as he admits, but the episode with his brother was shameful, disgusting, and made me not want to read one of his books again. I'll get over that, but it's says something that one finds that monster Humbert more sympathetic than his creator. Of course, the narrator here isn't unadulterated Nab; he's as much a creation as any of his characters. He's just not a very interesting one, neither insane nor funny. As Michael Wood suggests, the absences in this very word-, idea-, people- and event-heavy book are some kind of a failure. What we're left with is literature's most stunning prose poem since Woolf's To The Lighthouse, with a big black hole in the centre.

"Vera was a pale blonde when I met her, but it didn't take me long to turn her hair white."

The above was taken from one of Nabokov's own journal entries and, although it may seem humorous, it is no doubt true. Pulitzer-Prize winner, Stacy Schiff, suggests, even in the title of her book, that Véra Nabokov was a woman who was only capable of being known as Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov. Her relationship with her famed husband, no matter what its course, was the defining factor of her life. And Véra would have it no other way.

Véra Nabokov has been described as Vladimir Nabokov's "disciple, bodyguard, secretary-protector, handmaiden, buffer, quotation-finder, groupie, advance man, nursemaid and courtier." She is, not unjustly, celebrated as being the ultimate Woman Behind the Man.

Véra graduated from the Sorbonne as a master of modern languages, but, sadly, she did not keep copies of her own work as she did her husband's. In fact, she probably would have denied that her own work was worth keeping, although everything leads us to believe otherwise.

In addition to transcribing, typing and smoothing Valdimir's prose while it was still "warm and wet," Véra cut book pages, played chauffeur, translated, negotiated contracts and did the many practical things her famous husband disdained. This remarkable woman even made sure that the butterflies he collected died with the least amount of suffering.

A precocious child who read her first newspaper at the age of three, Véra was born into a middle-class Jewish family at the beginning of the twentieth-century in Czarist St. Petersburg. In 1921, with the advance of communism, her family settled in Berlin. It was there that she met the dapper and non-Jewish Vladimir. Their marriage would last fifty-two years and be described as an intensely symbiotic coupling.

Although Vladimir traveled and conducted several affairs, Véra supported him throughout, struggling to raise their son amidst the Nazism that was beginning to fester in Berlin. Blaming herself for her husband's infidelity, Véra managed to rejuvenate her marriage and the couple moved again--this time to New York City--where Véra typed Valdimir's manuscripts in bed while recovering from pneumonia. Forever believing in her husband's creative instincts, Véra stood by his art even when debt threatened to overtake them. It was she who intervened on the several occasions when Vladimir attempted to burn his manuscript of Lolita.

Véra Nabokov's tombstone bears the epithet, "Wife, Muse and Agent," and Nabokov knew the immensity of the debt he owed her. Late in life, he even refused to capture a rare butterfly he encountered in a mountain park for the sole reason that Véra was no longer at his side. Like her husband, Véra had highly developed aesthetic tastes and the two enjoyed a "tender telepathy." Often described as "synesthetes," the couple would have debates about "the color of Monday, the taste of E-flat." It is certainly without exaggeration that Nabokov wrote to Véra, "I need you, my fairy tale. For you are the only person I can talk to--about the hue of a cloud, about the singing of a thought, and about the fact that when I went out to work today and looked at each sunflower in the face, they all smiled back at me with their seeds."

Although many feel the Véra should have been encouraged to develop her own considerable talents, it can be argued that she did, and that her greatest talent was that of wife and helpmate. It is certainly one she choose freely and without rancor. The fact that her husband was fortunate, indeed, cannot be denied.

Véra is a book rich in detail, analysis and affection. Like all couples and all marriages, the Nabokovs were unique and they were special. To know one, was to glimpse the other, for with the passing of years, neither was wholly himself or herself. There are those who might not have understood Véra Nabokov's choices and might not have agreed with them, but they are the ones who have never known the ecstasy of a truly close relationship. Véra Nabokov was a most fascinating woman, one that made her own choices in life and lived them most happily. We can only admire her greatly.

In a vein not unsimilar to Brenda Maddox's biography of Nora Joyce a decade ago, Stacy Schiff compassionately and vividly weaves together the beautiful tapestry of Vladimir and Vera Nabokov. For those who thought the master's works can speak for themselves, they may want to think again. This lucid, brilliant book brings together the complex author's life, marriage, loves, ideals, frustrations, and, ultimately, genius as biographies rarely do. At the same time, Vera is no shrinking violet either and one wonders about what would have become of the author had she not been a tad forward about meeting him in the first place; certainly the history of 20th century literature would have suffered by it. My wish is that Ms Schiff continue in this vein...perhaps a different view of Frieda Lawrence or the long-suffering Mrs Dickens? Like this book, they will most likely be indispensable.

This is the book Nabokov fans have been waiting for, but suspected would never (COULD never) be written. From the opening sentences it's clear that Schiff has the stuff equal to her daunting task--to get behind the artfully constructed public face of two of the most brilliant, but most private, people ever to enter the public eye. Schiff does it with awesome research and a, by turns, witty, moving, penetrating, sometimes acerbic, but always admiring prose. The portrait of Vera, you feel, is definitive, but so, too, is the portrait of Vladimir--a portrait that points up the flaws and gaps in earlier depictions, like that of the dutifully plonking Boyd biographies with their laughable "interpretation" of Pale Fire. That Schiff is delineating the dynamic of a highly unique marriage (not just the two complex personalities that made up that marriage) makes her accomplishment seem all the more miraculous. Finally, Schiff's method is ultimately Nabovian in that she gives us a portrait of the master without peering at him directly: the book is Vladimir reflected in Vera's pale fire--which, as it turns out, is the best way to see him whole. Or, rather, to see them BOTH whole. After reading this book, it is impossible to speak of either Vladimir, or Vera, as a single entity, ever again.

With his earlier novels, such as King, Queen, Knave, and The Defense, Nabokov was unable to come up with stories that contained both the literary ripple of pleasure and the kind of plotting, page-turning stuff that makes people actually want to finish a book. Here the balance is more neatly struck; Hermann Hermann, a deluded precursor of Lolita's Humbert Humbert, is funny and engaging without being entirely sympathetic. He wants to fake his own death to escape from humdrum life, enlists the aid of his 'double', goes on to kill the double and dress him in his own (Hermann's) clothes. Problem is, the 'double' was Hermann's own creation, for the man he has killed does not resemble him in the least. Therein lies the crux of our tale: afterwards come police, pursuit, complications, etc. Now there is no one lovable here, but the fine net of perceptions, crystalized weaves of sense and sensation, are a pleasant counterpoint to the arch looniness of Hermann et al. The tone, above all, is one that will not be taken up again until Pnin, and and then followed hard upon by Lolita, Pale Fire, and Ada: arch and diabolically funny, the devil here being as usual in the details

The focus of a book review should supposedly be on the novel itself and not on the author, but I can't resist; Nabokov is a master. It's as if language were his own personal playground. The way he toys with words is amazing, and adds much to his books. I simply can't think of a writer with more linguistic talent. But on to the novel itself: Don't read Despair (or any of his other novels, for that matter) if you're looking for a simple, pleasant read. This book is dark, comedic, and often grotesque (but that's hardly a bad thing). It can be confusing at times, because the narrator is sly; the reader must be alert and ready to spot his outright lies, as well as his half-truths and truth-twistings. This makes for a very entertaining, if somewhat skewed, point of view. The plot itself isn't anything breathtaking or boldly original; however, Nabokov's style makes it seem that way. This is an intriguing, sharp-witted book by one of the most interesting authors to ever put pen to page. I dare say it's one of his best.

This book possesses something very rare: the ability to entertain as well as just about any Agathe Christie book along with a wildly rich variety of diction, intrigue, and (though the author denies it in his prologue) meaning. I have read it three times and each time I chuckle over some droll detail I missed on my last reading. Moreover, a great introduction to Nabokov: Ada and Pale Fire require much more cerebral work, and unlike Despair, don't lend themselves as easily to being happily re-read - something pretty much required if Nabokov can begin to be truly appreciated, as his stylings are difficult. A wild romp that will particularly be appreciated by worshippers of Dostoevsky and Pushkin, as critical extensions of some of their work are oddly offered (and strangely juxtaposed)as well. A solid, muscular masterpiece that makes much of Lolita look tame.

Evil lurks inside the man, chomping at the bit for its first chance to escape, but his conscience keeps him from carrying out his cruel and undignified desires. In Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, the reader is presented with an enthralling vision of a failed experiment in which a man attempts to separate his pure, angelic qualities and his dark, wicked inward wishes into two individual beings. A variable is horribly miscalculated, and instead of ending up with two embodiments, he only ends up with his evil side, which comes to be known as Edward Hyde, and his own self, a compound of a wholesome conscience and a hidden-away, satanic instinct which is part of all human beings. Definitely a book that can be viewed in a depressing, "can't-ignore-the-truth" type of light, this novel may set some readers in a direction that has them recognizing other parts of their own personality.
The story is set in London, England, in a 19th-century time period. I choose to view it as an example of a sci-fi horror novel. It's quite different from other chillers because of its lack of a murderer or a dangerous villain per se that everyone's hiding from. Oh, sure, Edward Hyde commits acts of horrific atrocity, but if you look beyond the hard, cold facts, you realize that these criminal acts are not the true object of the plot. The actual villain in this book is meant to be portrayed as the volatile human soul. The novel shows how dangerous some evil desires of even the kindest, most generous people can be. Take for instance Henry Jekyll, the main character of this book. He's as compassionate and gentle a person as you'll ever meet, but through Edward Hyde, he commits unforgivable acts that you would never have thought of Jekyll. It's a twisted version of the relationship between Superman and Clark Kent, his alter ego. In the form of Superman, Kent goes around the planet saving people and taking criminals to jail. In the form of Edward Hyde, Jekyll goes around trampling children and beating kindly old gentleman with canes for no apparent reason, then makes up for the crimes by taking money out of Henry Jekyll's bank account.
The characters in this book are quite a diverse crew. Instead of the predictable situation with the mad scientist, the damsel in distress, and the dashing hero, this novel features a troubled, kind scientist, his worried friends the lawyer (Mr. Utterson) and the butler (Poole), and an old acquaintance of the doctor's (Hastie Lanyon) that had a quarrel with Jekyll over some sort of scientific matter, creating a certain thickness between them. Finally, you have the scientist's alter ego, Edward Hyde, a hideous, small young man. Utterson is a lean, serious man that never smiles. "I incline to Cain's heresy; I let my brother go to the devil in his own way," says Utterson drearily. This is taken to mean that he only wants to worry about his own business, and nobody else's. Poole is not described in great lengths in this book; he is a friendly, elderly servant of Dr. Jekyll's. Later in the book, Lanyon is implored by Jekyll, trapped in the form of Hyde, possibly for life, to get him the necessary drugs to temporarily change back. Lanyon meets a sad death.
This book is excellently written, although its length is quite miniscule (70 pages). Robert Louis Stevenson integrates a sense of mystery into the plot, and although most educated persons know the basic story, you will still find yourself bristling with anticipation. Rarely does that suspense turn into boredom, as it does quite frequently in Bram Stoker's novel Dracula and many older works of horror. The reader is easily able to tell the difference between the voice tones of different characters, e.g. when Henry Jekyll tells his tragic story at the end. His sophisticated language is effortlessly distinguished from that of others who may have entries. Stevenson's dark and detailed descriptions of cold, deserted streets may give you chills as you are sucked into his vivid yet sinister worlds.
If I hadn't been forced to read this book by a certain time, I still might have picked it up off the shelf and read it eventually. That's achieving a point of loftiness with me, because I tend to be quite impatient with my books, wanting instant gratification of my needs for action and plot twists. It's very difficult to compare this book to works of other genres. Many other novels don't implement suspense because it's not needed. This book, however, is based on suspense. It's easy to hold the audience's attention here because of the shortness, but that doesn't mean that Stevenson did a cheesy job with the elements of the story. Much is packed into this dwarf of a book, and anybody who needs (or wants, for that matter) suspense in their life should pick it up

Ah, the classical dark tale of Dr. Jekyll and his mysterious, vicous, murderous counterpart, Mr Hyde. One of my favourite books, one that combienes science fiction and horror like few have others have done so well.

A book of suspense and mystery, it is foremost a book about psychology, exploring the sweet duality of Good and Evil. And though Hyde may be Evil, i have doubts about Jekyill being Good itself. No, the doctor is merely a troubled soul longing for freedom, and that's what Hyde gives. Freedon without consequences, a theme of debate even nowadys.

Stevenson's work is simply grounbreaking. It explores so many things: ethics in science; the limits of science and knowledge; how science may affect people. Like The Invisible Man, it talks about the tribulations of scientists and what are their limitations. It's also a dark view of science, for it makes it as something without benefits in the end.

But besides this, its still a horror story, a classical one, with all the old ingredients: dark nights; the london fog; a murderer walking about the streets after the next victims. And he does find a couple of them. In my chilliest moments, i like to think Jack the Ripper himself reed this book and decided to make it true.

Robert Louis Stevenson's "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" is an extremely well-written horror/mystery. While a relatively short novel, the intricately woven plot offers all the right details at different points. And at the end of the book, the characters all seem to make sense, with all of the given clues fitting very well.
This story of the nice, mellow Dr. Jekyll and his hidden mad-man persona, Mr. Hyde, is a classic clash of good and evil. The author does a wonderful job of keeping the reader wondering about each one's true identity. From Hyde's first trampling, to his murder, to the bitter end, he is portrayed as the exact opposite of Dr. Jekyll, despite an odd, hidden relationship. Only at the very end is the mystery compltely solved.
What makes the novel most unique is the inclusion of numerous other developed characters besides Jekyll and Hyde, such as Utterson, Lanyon, and Enfield. All in all, this is a timeless tale, a true stoy of inner conflict. What this novel lacks in length, it makes up for in well-developed characters, and a superb plot. A must-read.

I confess to finding Nabokov a strange writer. In novels such as "Bend Sinister", I find his style frequently irritating, almost as if he's writing the novel purely to amuse himself - this self-indulgence becoming almost unbearable. Indeed, in his introduction to this novel, Nabokov states that "in the long run...it is only the author's private satisfaction that counts". Really? Either this is monstrous egotism or vast insecurity. In my view, Nabokov is not the great author he perhaps thought himself to be (if one is to take such statements, and others, at their face value).

Nonetheless, I think that he is an interesting and at times challenging writer. In this book as in most of his others, it is fatal to give up half way through, as often the book's full effect and meaning only become apparent at or near the end. It's best to read this novel in as few sittings as possible to get the best effect - I shouldn't think that it would work as well in many, short bursts of reading. You need to immerse yourself in the claustrophobic and melancholic world created by Nabokov.

The story revolves around Adam Krug and his son David, who is seized by by agents of a totalitarian state. Will Krug recover the boy by submitting to the demands of the state? Thus the central theme of the novel is the love of the father for his son, most often conveyed in flash-backs. Nabokov confirms in his introduction that this indeed was his main theme, and disclaimed any idea that the novel was a political critique or satire. Take such statements at face value if you wish, but there's too much satire/criticism in the novel for that to be true. It would not be the novel it is without that totalitarian background: the claustrophobia and near Kafkaesque feeling of individual helplessness enhance the feelings of worry and despair Krug feels when his son disappears.

So, a novel to take time out to immerse yourself in, and overall to be patient with.

In 1984 Orwell gave us a terrifying study of the mind of a totalitarian socialist state. With BEND SINISTER, Vladimir Nabokov confronts a similar beast but instead of dissecting its addled brain, he explores its pathetic heart.

And BEND SINISTER, for my money, is the more frightening of the two. Bad ideas often prove less dangerous than madmen and madwomen who would tear down to world to avenge childhood slights.

Look out. The common man has taken over Ekwist and his name is Paduk. Paduk, the socially inept son of an inventor of insane gadgets such as a typewriter that duplicates one¡¯s own handwritten script, has seized control of the Eastern European backwater and only one thing stands in his way of complete domination: Adam Krug.

Krug, a world famous though colossally misunderstood philosopher, is Ekwist¡¯s only claim to global fame. Paduk needs Krug¡¯s allegiance if he is to have legitimacy. There are also unspoken old scores to settle: Krug and Paduk went to school together and the young philosopher had tormented the young dictator, dubbing him with the nickname toad, embarrassing him sexually and sitting on his face at every opportunity.

When Krug refuses to be bought with the highest academic post in the land, one of his friends after another starts disappearing. Krug, however, still refuses to sign a ridiculous oath of allegiance (which is partly plagiarized from Lenin). His resistance appears less heroic than an act of sheer stubbornness and intellectual snobbery, almost a personal indulgence.

But Paduk¡¯s henchmen finally get to Krug through his young son, David. How they do it is simply too horrible for me to repeat. Imagine something nearly unthinkable and you are half-way there. To be honest, the unspeakable fate David suffers (far worse than anything Lolita endures) soured the book for me. But such as with Nabakov¡¯s other controversial works, LOLITA, with its pedophilia, and ADA, with its paean to teenage incest, I can¡¯t honestly say that I regret reading the book, nor would I deny the experience to anyone else. Nabokov is that damn good.

I also can¡¯t honestly deny that this book is the work of a genius. It boasts several comic scenes worthy of the best of Monty Python. In one, Krug bounces from checkpoint to checkpoint on a bridge manned by idiotic and paranoid soldiers because he has no entry pass for one gate and no exit pass from the other. Equally side-splitting is Krug¡¯s savage dismissal of a mediocre academic sent by Paduk to woo him.

An optional course in this mini-feast of a book (it is only 201 pages) is this red herring served by Nabokov in his later essays, in which he claimed (it is hard to spot this when reading BEND SINISTER) that during the book Krug becomes aware that he is only Nabokov¡¯s creation, prompting him to undertake an existential revaluation of his own bonds with his friends and family. Krug seems to come to the conclusion that his love for his son is real whether he is or not, which may be Nabokov¡¯s biggest joke or his greatest truth or both.

Bend Sinister (1947) was the first novel Vladimir Nabokov wrote in the United States, and his second novel in English. Like one of his later Russian-language novels, Invitation to a Beheading, it is explicitly political, in a way generally foreign to Nabokov. (Indeed, to write a "political" novel was rather against Nabokov's usual artistic philosophy, and in his 1963 Introduction to this novel, he takes pains to point out that the focus of the novel is the main character's relationship with his son, not the repressive political conditions which drive the novel's plot.) Bend Sinister opens with the death of Olga Krug, beloved wife of philosopher Adam Krug. Krug is left with an 8-year old boy, David, in a country torn by a revolution led by an oafish schoolmate of Krug's, Paduk, called the Toad by his fellows at school. The new regime attempts to gain Krug's support, offering both the carrot of a University presidentship and the stick of veiled threats conveyed by the arrest, over time, of many of Krug's friends. The brutal climax comes when the new regime, almost by accident, realizes that the only lever that will work on Krug is threats to his son, then, due, apparently, to grotesque incompetence, manages to fumble away that lever.
The novel is (one is tempted to say "of course") beautifully written. Passage after passage is lushly quotable, featuring VN's elegant long sentences, lovely imagery, and complexly constructed metaphors; as well as his love of puns, repeated symbols, and humour. The characters are well-portrayed also -- Krug, of course, and his friends such as Ember and Maximov, as well as villains such as the Widmerpoolish dictator Paduk and the sluttish maid Mariette. The novel, though ultimately quite tragic, is filled with comic scenes, such as the arrest of Ember, and comic set-pieces, such as the refugee hiding in a broken elevator. As VN asserts, the relationship between Adam Krug and his son is the fulcrum on which the novel turns, and it is from that the novel gains its emotional power. But much of the novel is taken up with rather broad satire of totalitarian communism. The version portrayed here is of course an exaggeration of the true horror that so affected Nabokov's life, but it still has bite. The central philosophy of the new regime is not Marxism per se, but something called "Ekwilism", which resembles the philosophy satirized in Kurt Vonnegut's short story "Harrison Bergeron" -- it is the duty of every citizen to be equal to every other, and thus great achievement is unworthy. (It is not to be missed that Paduk was a failure and a pariah at school.) All this is bitterly funny, but almost unfortunate, in that it is so over the top in places that it can be rejected as unfair to the Soviet system which it seems clearly aimed at. That's really beside the point, however -- taken for itself, Bend Sinister is beautifully written, often very funny, and ultimately wrenching and tragic.

The Russians seem to have loved Byron. This work is really several stories and all enjoyable. I'm told by a friend that Lermontov is better known as a poet and I want to investigate that lead but this book is a highly entertaining introduction to this little read Russian. The locations are exotic, the Russian wild lands known as the steppe, and the hero travels by horse from one to the next. The book appeals as an adventure but the actual character of the hero is very complex, not at all like the usual adventure hero and thats because these are Byronic times when amourous endeavors are just momentary diversions to relieve one of ones own solitude and duels are really the only pursuits that awaken one fully. I was surprised how good this was. I don't think it is essential reading for anyone but if you read it you will smile knowingly every time you think about it or hear it mentioned. A Byronic smile. I'll get back with you after I have read the poetry.

Mikhail Lermontov was a poet by genius, a romantic at heart, yet by the time of his death at 26, he had already become something of a disillusioned realist. This tension between streaks in his personality is expressed openly in "A Hero of Our Time": the novel starts out as a romantic adventure beautified with most exquisite imagery, but is later transformed into a disquieting tale of manipulation and dark deeds.

The setting for this novel (which is really a loosely connected string of short stories) is the wild Caucasian mountains, to which Lermontov himself had been "exiled" to fight against the fierce Chechens. After the death of Pushkin, Lermontov took it upon himself to keep the great poet's legacy alive. The authorities did not take kindly to Lermontov's endeavour, and transferred the young officer to the war zone.

To 19th centrury Russian writers, the experience of the Caucasus and of 'Asiatics' in general was of tremendous value as a gauge of the value of Russian civilization. Juxtaposing Russian high society with the people of the steppes and the mountains became a familiar device in Russian literature, just like American Indians were used to symbolize the natural/unadulterated or the uncivilized/savage in American literature.

However, in "A Hero of Our Time" the officer Pechorin transcends the boundaries between culture and nature. In the early chapters of the book, Pechorin's adventures are described from outside, and seem extraordinary, bizzare, yet captivating. Later on, other stories are recounted in Pechorin's diary, and they draw a different picture of the modern hero: disillusioned, hateful, and profoundly unhappy. Life is a game which he has long mastered, he knows exactly how to play into people's pride, vanity and passion. Yet, at unlikely moments, a stir of long-forgotten emotion briefly produces a vulnerable, human hero with whom we, despite ourselves, are forced to identify...

Lermontov died age 27 leaving a body of poems and one prose work, a loose collection of stories about his 'anti-hero' Pechorin in "A Hero of Our Times"

The novel presents the misadventures of a Tsarist officer through the account of his early friend and through Pechorin's own diary. Pechorin is an immoral man, personifying the corruption of the early nineteenth century military classes in Russia.

For the concentration of the evils of Pechorin, for his treachery and seduction, this is a surprisingly 'modern' book, though written in the 1840s.

I recommend it for its economy and the strength of its portrayal of Pechorin. By his early death, Russian literature was robbed of a writer who may have joined the pantheon of the great Tsarist novelists.

I loved the colour of this novel, the brilliant use of imagery and the way Nabokov develops his character (Martin) so that my appreciation of and sympathy for him grew despite my initial inclinations.

The edition that I read was the Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics edition, with its blurb that largely quotes Nabokov himself. And in his own words he says 'In general Glory is my happiest thing. ................. although nothing much happens at the very end ...........' If this is in any way off putting (novels are supposed to be about tension and resolution after all) I recommend you ignore it. For me, despite what the author says, EVERYTHING happens at the end.

I found this a curious book. Up until the last few pages I did not care about any of the characters: even the main one, Martin, being so feckless, left me totally cold. I expected to finish the novel having appreciated the style in which it was written (which is excellent) but feeling utterly indifferent about the story line: just another well-written though utterly forgettable piece of fiction.

And yet, in the last few pages, Nabokov redeemed the story for me - sometimes it is worth persevering. It's best not to spoil the ending too much for those who haven't read the book, but careful concentration over the last pages bore fruit for me. I even forgave Nabokov for irritating me with the descriptions of yet another Cambridge fop (Darwin): how many of these quasi-Waugh Oxbridge stereotypes pop up in twentieth-century fiction?

One of the messages of the work for me was to engage with life, expect change, accept that people and situations will alter as time moves on. To paraphrase Proust: it's strange that people act as though today will last forever when all of our experience should tell us the opposite, that change is the normal state of affairs.

I wanted to read fairly short, impressive book during my winter break/holidays. So, Nabokov came to my mind. I picked up "Glory" and I was taken from the moment I started reading. Book about young Martin Edelweiss, of Swiss and Russian heritage, follows his quiet life from his early childhood to his life of the grown up, young man. His parents divorce during his childhood, and Martin's father dies soon afterwards. Martin's mother re-marries to his uncle who sends young Martin to the Cambridge University. Here, Martin acquires new friends and even falls in love with Sonia, ruthless daughter of the Russian emigre editor. Sonia seems to enjoy seducing young man but is ever so easy in discarding them in order to avoid long term commitment. Martin is no exception. And after college days are over, Martin decides to travel around Europe: England, Switzerland, Germany. His uncle/stepfather is concerned about Martin's lack of desire to find suitable position in order to ensure steady flow of income. And while Martin's friends are building their careers in journalism, writing and other "honorable" professions, he seems to rather enjoy doing manual labor in order to find his true self. Until one day - he goes away. Forever. Very powerful novel. It made me Nabokov's fan in a matter of moment.