Boyd has a done a good academic job but his subject is a 2nd rate hater of other, better, writers.

Well, it took awhile, but I enjoyed the first volume of Brian Boyd's two-volume biography of the great Russian emigre-American writer. Unlike Andrew Field's terrible bio, Boyd successfully reveals Nabokov's unique consciousness with great sympathy and clarity. In addition, the book reveals his travails following the Russian Revolution, including the murder of his beloved father by Russian Rightists (who were later promoted up the Nazi hierarchy by Hitler). This book does a great job of providing historical context to Nabokov's life. Long before LOLITA, Nabokov was writing great books, though he received nowhere near the recognition of other authors of the day, such as Fitzgerald, Joyce, Hemingway, Steinbeck and others. Whatever legacy he was building failed to reach much beyond the Russian emigre community in Europe, which was destroyed by World War II. When he and wife, Vera, and his son, Dimitri, fled for the U.S. in 1940 (with the Nazis right on their heels), he become, once again, an obscure writer. It would be a long road back.

Brian Boyd’s biography of Vladimir Nabokov is meticulously researched and unlikely to be surpassed anytime soon, if at all. In some ways, that’s unfortunate. While this is a foundational and necessary text for anyone who wants a deep understanding of Nabokov’s work, Boyd’s attitude towards his subject is often distractingly worshipful. Some of the faults stemming from this approach include Boyd’s tendency to make something of a show of criticizing obviously weak early work (presumably as an assertion of balance), and his irritating habit of gratuitously pointing out minor features (occasionally exaggerated) of early stories and novels that he claims anticipate developments in Joyce’s work, or were at least arrived at by Nabokov independently, supposedly free of Joyce’s influence. Nabokov’s reputation hardly needs boosts of this kind. Boyd also lapses into Nabokovianisms every now and again, which is grating, and appears to have internalized his subject to such an extent that there can be no real pretence of objectivity.

Although logistically necessary to gain access to Nabokov’s private papers and those held at the Library of Congress (access to which has been restricted by the estate until 2009), Boyd’s cooperation with the notoriously private Vera Nabokov and the pugnaciously protective Dmitri Nabokov raises questions as to how complete and objective this biography can really be. Although Boyd asserts his scholarly independence in his preface, the Nabokovs were very wary of biographers, particularly after having been burned by the rather strange Andrew Field, whose pseudo-scholarly, error-riddled, and sometimes bizarre critical and biographical work outraged the family.

The two volumes together are over 1,000 pages, so casual readers of Nabokov might find it a bit of a slog. Boyd is, however, an astute reader of Nabokov, and all the novels (along with many of the stories, plays, poems, essays, and so forth) are given critical attention, which makes this something more than a conventional biography. For anyone whose interest is strong enough, this is the best biography out there by far, regardless of its weaknesses.

I don't even know how to evaluate Volume I. This is the most exhaustive biography I've read, and it can be fatiguing, but to have such a wealth of information available in one place is invaluable. I appreciate Boyd's emphasis on Nabokov's art, although I would have liked a bit more emotional insight to make things a little less dry. But on the whole this is a magisterial work. I shall have to reread it when I've read the rest of Nabokov.

Interesting, but sometimes TMI on minutae

This is the first volume of the authoritative 2 volume biography of one of the most brilliant writers of the last hundred years, produced by the distinguished Nabokov's scholar.

Covering the first 40 years of Nabokov's life and his Russian works, this volume contains a treasure of context that would be entirely useless for a good (in the Nabokov's sense) reader of his novels.

For some bizarre reason, Boyd concludes that every Nabokov novel and most of his stories follow basically the same pattern, that in the ultimate analysis each of them can be decoded as some kind of M. R. Jamesque ghost story, where spectres of departed guide inept still surviving characters toward their (rather simplistic as ghosts go) ends. With varying degree of violence this analytical method is fearlessly applied to The Defence, The Eye, The Gift and The Real Life of Sebastian Knight. One cannot escape a grave suspicion that with Pale Fire and Ada apparitions will have a field day in the second volume.

As another famous biographer noted "for better or worse, it is the commentator who has the last word", but the author of these words would probably find it artistically justified that it might be the dead VN's shadow that guides the awkward pen to prove again that mimicry is beyond predator's powers of perception.

PS: on a more technical level, neither the first volume (in the text) nor the second (in the index) mention Harold Nicolson and his "Some people"---a missing link without which the genesis of Nabokov's English style remains incomprehensible.

I read parts of this for my undergraduate thesis.--Finally got around to reading the whole thing cover to cover.

just started it. he was kind of hot. five stars.

Vladimir Nabokov remains one of my favorite writers. After reading all his early Russian novels I thought it would be interesting to learn about his life and the conception of his novels. Nabokov had a very interesting life. He grew up in Russia during years of tumultuous political change and left as Bolshevism was growing to more legitimate heights. Then he settled in Germany until Hitler's rise to power became a threat. After destitution in France and the beginning of the second World War Nabokov and his family finally flee to America. While the historical eras he lived through were fascinating, the bookworm in me loved seeing his fiction detailed chronologically and analyzed in depth. It gave new background and understanding to the books I'd already read. Brian Boyd does a great job critiquing Nabokov's works and explaining their relation in his life. This volume analyzes novels from Mary to The Real Life Of Sebastian Knight and all the short stories in between. The rest of his novels and stories will be contained in the second volume. I'm excited to finish reading his English language novels and then continue with the second biography volume: The American Years. I'd recommend this biography for avid Nabokov fans and readers who enjoy literary criticism.

Tremendously well-researched and astute analysis from Boyd. A very thorough account of not only Vladimir Nabokov's life from 1899-1940, but a detailed illustration of his family ancestry and particularly his father's life, which gives more insight into the political aspects of Nabokov's work. The analysis is generally spot-on and very insightful as well, showing recurring patterns and themes in each specific work. However, I am sometimes annoyed by Boyd's complete worshiping of Nabokov. Boyd consistently tries to defend Nabokov at every turn and overemphasizes the importance of his Russian work (like concluding that "The Gift" is considered the greatest Russian novel of the 20th century by some scholars) and downplays Nabokov's homophobia which is a prominent theme (but was excluded from analysis in this biography) in both Despair and The Real Life of Sebastian Knight.

The most comprehensive biography of Nabokov's Russian years.

4,5
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