The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov

Just read the first and last page of each story, save yourself the 600 of fluff. For every 10 stories, one is good, nine are aggressively undistinguished and pedantic.

n  20/09/16n

I'm taking a class on Nabokov this semester and have finally been sent the reading list. This seemed like a really good collection to buy, because it includes almost all of the short stories on my set text list. The whole collection is huge, with 65 stories, and clearly it'll probably be a very long time before I read the whole thing, but I need to keep track of the stories I do need to read for class.

I've also found copies of the Russian originals, and although I'm not required to read the originals for the class, I feel like I should at least try. Anyone who has read anything by Nabokov will know his use of language, even in English, is complex and difficult, so I don't have much hope for any success in reading his style in Russian, but I'll at least have a look. His novels/novellas are definitely way out of my league, but I'm planning to try the short stories on my set text list.

So the lists below will help me keep track...

n  08/12/16n

The semester is (finally) coming to an end and I've finished all the set reading for this class. Have I read all 65 stories in this collection? No. Will I read more by Nabokov in the future, including from this collection? Almost certainly, but probably after a bit of a break, as otherwise I'd be risking Nabokov fatigue. I've really enjoyed this module, even if it was hard going at times (and I still have an essay to write..), and I think it's given me a really good grounding of Nabokov's work. I marking this as read for now (I think I've read enough to say I've 'read' his short stories!), but I'll be keeping a list below of the stories I'd like to try in the future, whenever I have the urge to dip into the collection again.

For anyone looking to try Nabokov's short stories, my favourites and the ones I'd recommend were 'Signs and Symbols', 'Spring in Fialta' and 'Terra Incognita'.

n  Stories to read in English for class:n
n  Terra Incognitan: (read 20/09/16) ★★★★½. Well, this was definitely a fantastic start! I attempted this in Russian first and, surprisingly, didn't find the language too taxing. When I read it in English straight after, I hadn't really missed out on anything. On top of that, it was also a first-class short story, enthralling and disturbing, about a feverish, nightmare of an expedition into the jungle gone awry, where perhaps reality isn't so certain.
n  The Leonardon: (read 21/09/16) ★★★. The beginning and end of the story were the best parts: the framing of the story with the narrator setting the scene with bringing on props. Also loved how the narrator was shocked and disappointed in the characters at the end of the story despite setting things in motion in the first place! Basically loved the narration, but there wasn't anything that interesting about the story itself. Also found it much trickier to read in Russian and didn't really understand the story fully until I read it in English. Maybe I need to re-read it now to see if I can make more sense of the language now.
n  Spring in Fialtan: (read 16/10/16) ★★★★. Beautiful, vivid prose in a sad reflection of past love. Perhaps a bit more straightforward then I'm used to with Nabokov by now, but the ending still packed a punch and there is an abundance of gorgeous imagery to lose yourself in. (I've yet to attempt this in Russian though..)
n  Visit to the Museumn: (read 19/10/16) ★. Zzzzzzz....
n  That Once In Aleppon: (read 20/10/16) ★★★.
n  Signs and Symbolsn: (read 22/10/16) ★★★★★. I am pretty certain this is the shortest of Nabokov's short stories I have read so far, but don't let that fool you. It packs a punch. If you haven't read much by Nabokov yet, and are unsure where to start, this was certainly be a good place to begin. It's a powerful, moving glimpse into the life of an immigrant couple visit their son in a mental asylum on his birthday. The denial, fear, hopelessness, desperation for understanding is clear. Simply perfect and an example of what a short story should be.
n  The Vane Sistersn: (read 24/10/16) ★★★½. Again beautiful, vivid language, but content wise I simply didn't feel as moved by this one as, for example, 'Spring in Fialta' or 'Signs and Symbols'.

n  Stories to attempt in Russian for class:n
n  Terra Incognita / Терра Инкогнитаn
n  The Leonardo / Королекn
Spring in Fialta / Весна в Фиальте
Visit to the Museum / Посещение музея
That Once In Aleppo / Как-то раз в Алеппо...

>Stories to read outside of class:
The Wood-Sprite
Russian Spoken Here
The Potato Elf
The Circle
A Russian Beauty
Torpid Smoke
Cloud, Castle, Lake
Lik
Mademoiselle O
Time and Ebb

Nabakov is a master of the form. Although I've read a couple of his novels I will definitely track down a few more

Here's why this story is enchanting:

" I could isolate, consciously, little. Everything seemed
blurred, yellow-clouded, yielding nothing tangible. Her inept
acrostics, maudlin evasions, theopathies-- every recollection
formed ripples of mysterious meaning. Everything seemed
yellowly blurred, illusive, lost. "

: Icicles by Cynthia, meter from Sybil https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acrostic

Daug įvairių temomis, idėjomis, siužetais pasakojimų. Pasakojimus jungia rusų emigrantų gyvenimai, įžvalgos bei nostalgijos, prisiminimų carinei Rusijai fiksavimas. Įdomu tai, kad visi paminėti momentai vertinami ironiškai, siejami su nuotykių, detektyvinės intrigos, mistiniai įvykiais. Žodžiu, verta paskaityti siekiant geriau suprasti Rusijos žmogaus pasaulėjautą, emocijas.

3.75 stars

Finally I finished reading this book with its 68 stories (sixty-five stories, as informed in one of its back pages), I found most of them enjoyable but some a bit lengthy, tedious and typically Russian since, I think, Nabokov's written impeccably in inimitable English narrative as well as some French, German and Russian phrases/sentences here and there with which his readers should be familiar, for the sake of better understanding. For instance:
1) Tu es tres hippique ce matin (p. 489)
2) Was dort fur Skandale? (p. 336)
3) il y a pauvre Ilya (p. 574)
etc.
I'm sorry each is Greek to me, how should I solve the problem? I hit a snag every time I came across these non-English sentences/phrases, therefore, they've posted obvious obstacles that definitely nullify my understanding.
One more thing, when we read stories written by Russian authors, they tend to put Russian names as their characters, I wonder why. I think it might be one of their linguistic identities, therefore, we need to recall which ones have said or done anything in what context in a particular story. I usually find it a bit harder than reading the stories written by other Western writers from the U.K., The U.S., or Australia.

There are three stories I liked most:

1) "A Letter that Never Reached Russia", written from Berlin, has presumably revealed a Russian emigrant’s deepening love as noted from his addressing in the letter: “My charming, dear, distant one” (p. 155), “my love” (p. 155), and “dear” (twice, p. 158). Thus, we can’t help visualizing his loving thought of her and I liked this excerpt in the last paragraph:
"Listen: I am ideally happy. My happiness is a kind of challenge. As I wander along the streets and the squares and the paths by the canal, absently sensing the lips of dampness through my worn soles, I carry proudly my ineffable happiness. … " (p. 158)

2) "A Nursery Tale" which is about “a shy dreamer makes a deal with the Devil” (back cover) due to his roving eyes wherever he sits in public places, therefore, he is doomed to engage in a race against time despite the warning from Frau Monde, “Well, that’s your stop. Very wise to call it a day.” (p. 189).

3) "First Love" involves the narrator’s journey from Russia to stay near the beach in France in Parts 1-2. The opening paragraph in Part 3 wonderfully sets the scene:
" On the browner and wetter part of the plage, that part which at low tide yielded the best mud for castles, I found myself digging, one day, side by side with a little French girl called Colette." (p. 696)
And admittedly, “… Two years before, on the same plage, I had been much attached to the lovely, suntanned little daughter of a Serbian physician; but when I met Colette, I knew at once that this was the real thing. …” (p. 697)
We can see the narrator has his own means in proving his love and an unexpected reward, “… I could not destroy the mosquitoes that had left their bites on her frail neck, but I could and did, have a successful fistfight with a red-haired boy who had been rude to her. She used to give me warm handfuls of hard candy. One day, as we were bending together over a starfish, and Colette’s ringlets were tickling my ears, she suddenly turned toward me and kissed me on the cheek. So great was my emotion that all I could think of saying was, ‘You little monkey.’” (p. 697)

However, I’ll find time to reread "The Visit to the Museum" so that I would write something about it because it is also my favorite because its plot is uniquely of subtle horror I've never read before.

Reading Nabokov's stories, I think, we can learn a lot from his narrative, that is, we'd of course find many new words used in various contexts since he's written these stories as a professional. Interestingly, he has coined some new words for his readers such as raylets (p. 186), orangeade (p. 613), marbleized (p. 676), etc.

Some sentences are impressively unique, for instance: "Since morning the sky had been blindingly white and the sun had been moonlike." (p. 38), "I'm no longer in the bloom of youth." (p. 301), "The folly of chance is the logic of fate." (p. 334), etc.

Moreover, the pages around one third of the copy, that is, after Page 500 miserably split from its spine due to, I think, the glue quality and I found them impossible to replace them to their normal position. This is one of the reasons why the hard-cover ones rarely split due to the more permanently binding quality. I have no choice so “I’ll grin and bear it”. (p. 25)

Find one yourself, read as many stories as you like to learn how Nabokov has moulded and manipulated the language (as reviewed by Daily Mail) and enjoy!

A little overwhelming ... so many stories! More of a dip-in and read one or two at a time kind of collection, but I always stand humbled in the face of his utter brilliance as a writer.

A wonderful short story collection ranging from light-hearted tales to ones that will break your heart. I'm a big Nabakov fan and recommend this to my friends who are curious about his works.