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Humbert thinks of asking Quilty for at one point, albino Jack Humbertson,
even (especially, since he hints that H.H. is a hybrid of sorts) Jean-Jacques
Humbert all may be seen as playful namesakes, the literary progeny, of
John Ray.30 Such subliminal clues as these in Lolita complement Nabokov s
well known use of lepidoptera as markers of authorial presence and power
operative at critical points in his character s lives.31
At the extreme end of obscurity lies the type of clue exemplified by the
embedded Clare, Clare Q in Clark s name in the Foreword and the hidden
Beale in Beardsley, a kind of trace I call a shadowgraph. It seems ap-
propriate to call such cryptograms shadowgraphs; like the shadowgraphs Lolita
reports in the chapter with Nabokov s fourth secret point ( We made shadow-
29. To take just a few examples: unwittingly invoking Ray s book on the
senses once more, Humbert gets in touch with a private detective, an ex-
pugilist who, after taking Humbert s money, checks nonsense data for two
years; foreshadowing the ex-pugilist s sting is the extortion at the hands of an
ex-detective in Paris who had served in the police ; in the middle of Hour-
glass Lake, Humbert (a puppet watching puppets) knows exactly who the
puppets working on the far shore are: one is a retired policeman of Polish de-
scent ; during Humbert s last meeting with Dolly, an afterwork radio sings
of folly and fate ; at the Enchanted Hunters, Humbert says a skeleton glow
came through the Venetian blind from the outside arclights; these intercrossed
rays penetrated the darkness of the bedroom and revealed the [& ] situation.
30. A particularly nice example of Ray s toying with H.H. follows the
hitting the jackpot clatter of coins returned to Humbert in a phone booth
immediately after he learns that Lolita is in fact on a hike he had earlier fab-
ricated for the Farlows (100), when Humbert is made to wonder if this
sudden discharge, this spasmodic refund, was not correlated somehow, in the
mind of McFate, with my having invented that little expedition before ever
learning of it as I did now (107).
31. In addition to such lepidopteral references in Lolita noted by Appel
(327), I would include more abstract images such as the doors open like
wings on the Packard that kills Charlotte, the millions of so-called millers
Humbert sees as he returns alone to the motel in Elphinstone after leaving
Lolita at the hospital, and the moths in H.H. s headlights as he drives to and
from Pavor Manor the night before he confronts Quilty. See also notes 43, 44,
74, and related discussion in the essay.
Who s Who in the Sublimelight 157
graphs. Gee, what fun [114]), these puzzles reveal (to eyes that cannot unsee
them) the letters of hidden names embedded in a matrix of surrounding text
just as the radiograph or X-ray reveals the bones within the flesh.32 Lolita s
comment is pointedly recalled by H.H. at the close of Chapter 30 of Part II in
wording and imagery that links Ray s scheme, Humbert s heart condition,
tantalization, the resurrection theme, subliminal subtexts, Quilty s ingenious
play, and a Proustian echo:
Some way further across the street, neon lights flickered twice slower than
my heart: the outline of a restaurant sign, a large coffee-pot, kept burst-
ing, every full second or so, into emerald life, and every time it went out,
pink letters saying Fine Foods relayed it, but the pot could still be made
out as a latent shadow teasing the eye before its next emerald resurrection.
We made shadowgraphs. This furtive burg was not far from The En-
chanted Hunters. I was weeping again, drunk on the impossible past.
(282)
Quilty s name hiding in the word quietly in one of the more famous pas-
sages of the novel33 qualifies as a shadowgraph as I use the term, and there
are also dozens of examples of the letters of John Ray s surname repeatedly
occurring in clustered words or phrases which attract the eye of a reader
searching for clues in response to Nabokov s persistent needling. For instance,
in the passage above, Ray s name is embedded twice as a shadowgraph, the
two cryptograms spaced, like the blinking light, at an interval of a full second
or so. 34 Here Nabokov literally puts Ray s double name up in lights while
32. Dolinin comments on Nabokov s planting of Lear s name in a lyrical
passage with a Shakespearean subtext in Part II s Chapter 32 where Humbert
recalls rocking Lo/Cordelia in his marbLE ARms ( Lolita in Russian
325 26).
33. Proffer, discussing Humbert s near revelation of Quilty s name to the
reader after Lolita reveals it to him ( Quietly the fusion took place [272])
comments: Quietly, of course, is a phonetic and visual imitation of Quilty
(75).
34. pink letteRs sAYing Fine Foods RelAYed it Such a trace would
seem to be a variant forerunner of Nabokov s use of an acrostic composed of
the initial letters of words in the last paragraph of The Vane Sisters to reveal
a spectral message, and, in the same story, the initial letters of words in a
phrase of the narrator to incorporate the signature of the first dead sister:
S-y-b-i-l as noted by Tammi (295). Not infrequently, as in the present case,
Nabokov locates the shadowgraph in a related image. Another such subliminal [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
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Humbert thinks of asking Quilty for at one point, albino Jack Humbertson,
even (especially, since he hints that H.H. is a hybrid of sorts) Jean-Jacques
Humbert all may be seen as playful namesakes, the literary progeny, of
John Ray.30 Such subliminal clues as these in Lolita complement Nabokov s
well known use of lepidoptera as markers of authorial presence and power
operative at critical points in his character s lives.31
At the extreme end of obscurity lies the type of clue exemplified by the
embedded Clare, Clare Q in Clark s name in the Foreword and the hidden
Beale in Beardsley, a kind of trace I call a shadowgraph. It seems ap-
propriate to call such cryptograms shadowgraphs; like the shadowgraphs Lolita
reports in the chapter with Nabokov s fourth secret point ( We made shadow-
29. To take just a few examples: unwittingly invoking Ray s book on the
senses once more, Humbert gets in touch with a private detective, an ex-
pugilist who, after taking Humbert s money, checks nonsense data for two
years; foreshadowing the ex-pugilist s sting is the extortion at the hands of an
ex-detective in Paris who had served in the police ; in the middle of Hour-
glass Lake, Humbert (a puppet watching puppets) knows exactly who the
puppets working on the far shore are: one is a retired policeman of Polish de-
scent ; during Humbert s last meeting with Dolly, an afterwork radio sings
of folly and fate ; at the Enchanted Hunters, Humbert says a skeleton glow
came through the Venetian blind from the outside arclights; these intercrossed
rays penetrated the darkness of the bedroom and revealed the [& ] situation.
30. A particularly nice example of Ray s toying with H.H. follows the
hitting the jackpot clatter of coins returned to Humbert in a phone booth
immediately after he learns that Lolita is in fact on a hike he had earlier fab-
ricated for the Farlows (100), when Humbert is made to wonder if this
sudden discharge, this spasmodic refund, was not correlated somehow, in the
mind of McFate, with my having invented that little expedition before ever
learning of it as I did now (107).
31. In addition to such lepidopteral references in Lolita noted by Appel
(327), I would include more abstract images such as the doors open like
wings on the Packard that kills Charlotte, the millions of so-called millers
Humbert sees as he returns alone to the motel in Elphinstone after leaving
Lolita at the hospital, and the moths in H.H. s headlights as he drives to and
from Pavor Manor the night before he confronts Quilty. See also notes 43, 44,
74, and related discussion in the essay.
Who s Who in the Sublimelight 157
graphs. Gee, what fun [114]), these puzzles reveal (to eyes that cannot unsee
them) the letters of hidden names embedded in a matrix of surrounding text
just as the radiograph or X-ray reveals the bones within the flesh.32 Lolita s
comment is pointedly recalled by H.H. at the close of Chapter 30 of Part II in
wording and imagery that links Ray s scheme, Humbert s heart condition,
tantalization, the resurrection theme, subliminal subtexts, Quilty s ingenious
play, and a Proustian echo:
Some way further across the street, neon lights flickered twice slower than
my heart: the outline of a restaurant sign, a large coffee-pot, kept burst-
ing, every full second or so, into emerald life, and every time it went out,
pink letters saying Fine Foods relayed it, but the pot could still be made
out as a latent shadow teasing the eye before its next emerald resurrection.
We made shadowgraphs. This furtive burg was not far from The En-
chanted Hunters. I was weeping again, drunk on the impossible past.
(282)
Quilty s name hiding in the word quietly in one of the more famous pas-
sages of the novel33 qualifies as a shadowgraph as I use the term, and there
are also dozens of examples of the letters of John Ray s surname repeatedly
occurring in clustered words or phrases which attract the eye of a reader
searching for clues in response to Nabokov s persistent needling. For instance,
in the passage above, Ray s name is embedded twice as a shadowgraph, the
two cryptograms spaced, like the blinking light, at an interval of a full second
or so. 34 Here Nabokov literally puts Ray s double name up in lights while
32. Dolinin comments on Nabokov s planting of Lear s name in a lyrical
passage with a Shakespearean subtext in Part II s Chapter 32 where Humbert
recalls rocking Lo/Cordelia in his marbLE ARms ( Lolita in Russian
325 26).
33. Proffer, discussing Humbert s near revelation of Quilty s name to the
reader after Lolita reveals it to him ( Quietly the fusion took place [272])
comments: Quietly, of course, is a phonetic and visual imitation of Quilty
(75).
34. pink letteRs sAYing Fine Foods RelAYed it Such a trace would
seem to be a variant forerunner of Nabokov s use of an acrostic composed of
the initial letters of words in the last paragraph of The Vane Sisters to reveal
a spectral message, and, in the same story, the initial letters of words in a
phrase of the narrator to incorporate the signature of the first dead sister:
S-y-b-i-l as noted by Tammi (295). Not infrequently, as in the present case,
Nabokov locates the shadowgraph in a related image. Another such subliminal [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]