2,5

Роман был написан Набоковым в Германии, под псевдонимом Сирин. Его структурообразующим элементом является традиционный бульварный любовный треугольник - богатый муж Драйер (король), его красавица жена Марта (дама) и молодой любовник Франц (валет). Роман разворачивается совершенно тривиально в соответствии с традициями данного жанра – муж ни о чем не догадывается, жена с любовником замышляют, как его убить и завладеть его состоянием. Можно отметить, что автор тонко насмехается, как любовники изучают яды и другие способы убийства и приходят к выводу, что убить бесследно и без улик практически невозможно. Они почти реализовали свой план потопления не умевшего плавать Драйера, но он ненароком упомянул, что почти наверняка заработает на будущей неделе несколько сот тысяч марок. Это его и спасло. Жадность обуяла Марту, и она решила, что заманить его в лодку через несколько дней будет совсем несложно. Сцена с замыслом утопления мужа очень сильно напоминает аналогичную сцену из романа Золя «Тереза Ракен», только без натурализма и углубления в психологическое состояние. Пошел дождь, она промокла, заболела пневмонией и скоропостижно умерла на руках безутешного мужа. Франц вздохнул с облегчением. Больших художественных достоинств в этом романе нет. Возможно, Набоков писал это роман для заработка, ориентируясь на вкусы публики, любящей беллетристику. И в этом трагедия большого мастера, вынужденного выбирать между заработком в угоду непритязательному читателю и растратой таланта на пустяки.

Nabokov blows me away. What appears to be a fairly straight-forward love triangle gets all doppelgängered-up at the end. While Nabokov said "of all [his] novels this brute is the gayest", I found it far more brute than gay. Only Nabokov could make the heavy themes of the pre-Nazi German psyche appear 'gay'. Not only is Nabokov able to get this cement kite airborne, but he is also able to make it seem light and nimble as it dances in the sunlight. You almost forget that he is writing about the dehumanization of the individual, the moral seduction and corruption of a nephew, and avunculicide. Don't sweat the bumbling Nazi in the making... that might just be Old Enricht's strange invention laughing next door.

بیاید عادی سازی کنیم که هر نویسنده‌ای حق داره کتاب بد و فرا خسته‌کننده بنویسه؛ حتی اگر ناباکوف باشه.
دو ستاره فقط به خاطر شروع خوبش.

Vladimir Nabokov's second novel is a masterpiece of descriptive prose and lyricism that demands attention seriously right from the beginning of the very first sentence that sends the huge clock on a railway station with its once-a-minute gesture to the dizzying heights of literary hyperbole as the momentary transience of the scene with the train embarking on its next journey surfaces in a mixture of the most rhetorical of depictions ever written. I have never before read prose akin to that level of lyrical mastery. Vladimir Nabokov is at his lyrical best in this which he chose to term 'the gayest' of his novels.

The plot, according to me, is fairly straightforward and any representation by myself of it for the umpteenth time would only be verging towards rank mediocrity or banality. There is another great sequence of descriptive prose towards the end in the rowing scene where Dreyer, Martha and Franz were sunk deep in the morass of conspiracy when Martha and Franz were going over a plan to do away with Martha's tiresome husband.

Simply stated, in matters of pure descriptive imagery, there is hardly anyone on par with Vlad. Hence the sheer justification with which I heartily recommend this one to lovers of classic literature.

Olayımız çok tanıdık. Zengin kocasına parası için katlanan bir paragöz kadın, vurdumduymaz kocası ve onun saf yeğeni ile aralarında başlayan tutkulu aşk. Aslında hepsinin hayattaki amaçları farklıydı, ama tesadüfler ve bastırılamaz duygular(!) ile durum değişiyor ve bu da sonları oluyor. Normalde çok sıkılacağım, trajik sona bağlanacağını bilerek okumaya katlanamayacağım bir kitap olurdu. Ama yazan Nabokov olunca durum değişiyor. Baştan sona her üç karakterin duygu değişimleri o kadar iyi anlatılıyor ki, her bir sahneyi tek tek gözler önüne seriyor. (Özellikle, kendi yaşadıklarını düşününce olduğu yere kusan saf aşığın trajedisi ve ev sahibinin halleri çok iyiydi.)
Kendine has inceden müstehcen anlatım, zıpır esprilerle ve merak uyandırmaktaki kurgusuyla yine severek okuduğum bir Nabokov kitabı oldu.

Kartais užtenka vienos knygos ir supranti, kad autorius visiškai tavo. Taip man nutiko su Nabokovu ir jo "Lolita". Likau pakerėta rašymo stiliumi, estetika, elegancija ir buvo visiškai aišku, kad "Lolita" nebus paskutinė mano skaityta autoriaus knyga. Leidyklos "Jotema" išleista Nabokovo knyga "Karalius, dama, valetas" sudomino ne tik dėl to, kad ją rašė Nabokovas, bet ir dėl to, kad tai ankstyvojo jo kūrybos periodo vaisius. Visuomet įdomu palyginti, kaip atrodo brandūs kūriniais su kūrybos pradžia. Tuo metu Nabokovas gyveno Vokietijoje, o ir rašė ne angliškai, bet rusiškai. Net ir pasirašinėjo kitu slapyvardžiu - Sirinas.

"Karalius, dama ir valetas" siužetas paprastas ir net šiek tiek banalus. Yra meilės trikampio motyvas. Vyresnė moteris įsimyli savo vyro sūnėną. Jai pavyksta vaikinuką suvilioti ir už vyro nugaros užmegzti slaptą romaną. Grimztant gilyn į šį romaną, užgimsta šaltakraujiškas planas, ką daryti su savo vyru. Apie tai plačiau ir kuo viskas baigsis galėsite sužinoti perskaitę romaną. Tiek trumpai apie siužetą, kuris tikrai nėra pretenzingas, bet vis tik, manau, kad dėmesio centre čia ne ką rašo Nabokovas, bet kaip skleidžiasi jo pasakojimas, kaip jis dėsto savo mintis. O jis tikras žodžio meistras. Jau matosi ir to vėlesniojo brandaus autoriaus braižas - rafinuota pasakojimo maniera, ironija, didelis poreikis estetikai.

Pritrūko daugiau psichologijos. Veikėjų psichologiniai portretai tarsi praplaukė paviršiumi. Norėjosi detaliau ir giliau.

Kam skaityti? Tiems, kurie myli Nabokovą ir nori susipažinti su ankstyvąja jo kūryba.

اول بگم که من مشکل شخصی با ناباکوف دارم. به آقام داستایوفسکی توهین کرده. حیف که عمرش قد نداد وگرنه خودم می‌رفتم و با پشت دست می‌زدم تو دهنش. یعنی چی تیپ‌های کلیشه‌ای و اغراق‌آمیز؟ دوست داشته! مگه اصلاً در حدی هستی که از داستایوفسکی انتقاد کنی؟

حالا اگه امیل زولا ناباکوف رو می‌دید، می‌زد رو شانه‌اش و می‌گفت: "هی ولادیمیر، من مثل اینو 60 سال پیش نوشتم." ناباکوف می‌گفت: "بابا امیل بی‌خیال، شخصیت داستان من ناتورالیسم و واقع‌گرایی و اینا نداره. شوخ‌طبع و پیچیده‌ست. اصلاً ربطی به اون چیزا نداره."

فرانتس من که با زن شوهردار می‌پره، فرق می‌کنه. امیل بهش می‌گه: "بابا بی‌خیال، خیانت خیانته دیگه."

حالا در هر صورت نمی‌شه شباهت زیاد داستان "شاه، بی‌بی، سرباز" به رمان "ترز راکن" امیل زولا رو منکر شد. ولی سبک روایی ناباکوف با زولا واقعاً فرق داره. توی رمان "ترز راکن" واقعاً آدم یخ می‌زنه و لرزش می‌گیره. شباهت زیادی به رمان "ژرمینال" داره. ولی لحن روایی ناباکوف خیلی گرم و پر از شوخیه.

هر دو رمان به پیچیدگی‌های روانی شخصیت‌ها و عواقب جنایت می‌پردازند. در "شاه، بی‌بی، سرباز"، نقشه‌های خیانت‌آمیز و قتل منجر به عواقب غیرمنتظره و تراژیک می‌شوند و شخصیت‌ها با احساس گناه و تردیدهای درونی دست و پنجه نرم می‌کنند. همین مسئله در "ترز راکن" نیز دیده می‌شود؛ جایی که ترز و لوران پس از قتل، با عواقب روانی و اخلاقی شدید آن مواجه می‌شوند.

Dit verhaal is hilarisch van begin tot eind! Nabokov neemt een loopje met de ernst. Ik geef geen waardering, want ondanks dit en soms pagina’s lange prachtige zinnen kon het me niet echt boeien: klaarblijkelijk las ik het op een verkeerd moment.

The book is worth reading, especially for Nabokov fans.

کتاب خوبی بود از نظر داستان. گاهی حوصله سر بر میشد. گاهی ادمو سرگردان میکرد با کلمات که چیزی اتفاق افتاده یا نه دارن تصور میکنن. و آخرشم اونجوری که میخواستم نشد =))

Folks, this is the novel in which young Vladimir spread his butterfly wings. I absolutely loved it! It is a deliciously wicked satire of lust, adultery, youthful folly, and ambition. There are eccentric inventors, monkeys who set things on fire, and any number of delicious plot twists -- all with Nabokov's beautiful language (yes, this was one of his Russian novels, but it is clear from the prose that Vladmir and Dimitry labored amighty on this). It also serves, to some extent, as a proto-LOLITA, with the aunt in this case lusting for and wishing to dominate her starry-eyed nephew. Nabokov has often been criticized for how he brings pellucid romantic beauty to inappropriate relationships. And the humorless moralizers who tender this canard often can't recognize that this is, in part, the point of Nabokov. Even the most monstrous acts of human behavior can be perceived from an elegant perch.

This started out so promising, leaving me comparing the prose to Willa Cather as both authors were working their own strained relationships to 1920's modernity, both with some focus on the railways. Here Nabokov opens by capturing the experience of train travel, and evokes that world encapsulated by a rocking confined metal box hurtling through moving fields for hours on end. Then, as Franz first sees Berlin without his glasses, the prose overdoes itself: n  

"Once in the street he was engulfed in streaming radiance. Outlines did not exist, colors had no substance. Like a woman‘s wispy dress that has slipped off its hanger, the city shimmered and fell in fantastic folds, not held up by anything, a discarnate iridescence limply suspended in the azure autumnal air."

nThis is Nabokov's second novel, written in Berlin, about all German characters, but by an author who, as he explains in his 1968 introduction, knew no German. His characters could have been placed almost anywhere, although not in any time, and the book still works. That is, there is a light touch on who these characters really are - a successful merchandise store owner who capitalized on the 1920's, his younger thoroughly unhappy wife, and his nephew who comes to him for employment. The book plays out an almost reverse Lolita, as the wife pounces, cougar-like, on the nephew, and immediately wipes out the prose. Once she makes her move, the young nephew fills space, the cold husband drifts off, more interested in artificial people, and the wife's planning and plotting and feeling and thinking run headlong through most of the rest of the book. This is a character attack, but a humorous one. It reads fast, is more or less predictable, but just has enough to save itself in the very last paragraph...which, whether you like that paragraph or not, provides a supplement of reflection to the run-on plot.

So, a mixed result here. The still young author perhaps got tangled up in his own plot. But it has a little bit of substance, maybe just enough.

...

Of course I thought of Dante, especially as Franz stumbles through Berlin blindly and later with glasses, seeing the sights and sins. And there is this line, as Franz finally leaves his sex-stained slum apartment for the last time, but it still remains:

"The pattern on the wallpaper-bouquets of blood-brown flowers in a regular succession of repeated variations—arrived at the door from three directions but then there was no further place to go, and they could not leave the room, just as human thoughts, admirably coordinated though they may be, cannot escape the confines of their private circle of hell."

...

Recommended only to Nabokov completists.

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13. King, Queen, Knave by Vladimir Nabokov
translation: from Russian by Dmitri Nabokov, with the author who partially rewrote it, 1968
published: 1928
format: 177-page paperback
acquired: December
read: Feb 19-28
time reading: 9 hr 41 min, 2.1 min/page
rating: 3
locations: Berlin, the Pomeranian coast
about the author April 22 1899 – July 2 1977. Russia born, educated at Trinity College in Cambridge, 1922, later lived in Berlin (1922-1937), the US (1941-1961) and Montreux, Switzerland (1961-1977).