Speak, Memory
Speak, Memory is an autobiographical memoir by writer Vladimir Nabokov. The book includes individual essays published between 1936 and 1951 to create the first edition in 1951. Nabokov's revised and extended edition appeared in 1966. (Wikipedia)
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- The article has interesting things to say about Nabakov's "Pale Fire", but perhaps does not stress sufficiently that, like Dick's novels, it is very, very funny (and tragic); if you haven't read it (and others like "Lolita" and "Pnin" and his autobiographical work, "Speak Memory"), you owe it to yourself to do so! At the least, you will have some laughs.
- Off the top of my head:
The Soul of a New Machine by Tracy Kidder
A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again by D.F. Wallace
Speak, Memory by Vladimir Nabokov
Anything by John McPhee
Edit: formatting
- Nabokov was also supposed to have experienced synesthesia*.
2 thoughts:
1. Nabokov’s synesthesia was largely why..IMO..made his writing captivating. The first sentence of Lolita makes you gasp. It ‘hits’ you where you didn’t expect it and you like it.
The subject matter of Lolita was likely secondary to the synesthetic appeal of the language of Nabokov. It’s is a linguistic neural dissonance.
It reminds of Szechuan peppers in Hunan/Szechuan cuisine. The addition of which gives you a numbing tingling sensation to the inside of your mouth. It is called ‘mala’ in mandarin. It is also said to cause neurological dissonance especially when used with spicy foods.
Szechuan peppers themselves are not peppers but from the citrus family. They are often used with hot peppers..often mildly hot peppers but the numbing/tingling sensation makes the eater think that they are eating something super spicy ..far more spicier than it really is..and the body reacts with watering eyes and increased heartbeat and that endorphin rush associated with eating capsaicin.
It’s the same thing reading Nabokov. You expect to read a story and you are entirely bowled over by the sensory aspect of his language. Even though Lolita is his most popular work, he has written so much more. Pale Fire, Speak, Memory, Real life of Sebastian Knight..
2. My second thought is that authors who are non native English speakers/writers have remarkably rich vocabulary that is super descriptive. English is not a voluptuous language.
Others that come to mind are Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Neruda, Borges, Italo Cavalo, Umberto Eco, Marukami, Junichiro Tanizaki and the many Asian languages to English translations. Something lyrical in these languages is beautiful transmitted into English..a quality that English itself doesn’t seem to possess.
On a slightly different note: older languages like Sanskrit and the even earlier like epic of Gilgamesh relied on meter. As our speaking faculties expanded to accommodate more experiences and senses..and as we became more musical, language evolved too. It is the most beautiful evolution of the human state and we barely pay attention to language’s evolution.
I also think Germans shouldn’t be translating anything to English or anything from any other language to English. I don’t know German but I can often tell if any translation has had a translator remotely connected to the language. The language doesn’t lend itself to fluidity and nimbleness. Altho I have read some translations of Carl Jung’s Red Book from High German to English that intrigued and somewhat appealed to me. I don’t know if it was the translator or Jung’s language/words itself.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia
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http://nabokovsecrethistory.com/news/nabokovs-synesthesia-an...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_people_with_synesthe... : List of people with synesthesia
- Thanks for sharing this. I'll never forget reading Speak Memory. (!) The opening sentences or somewhere near the opening ones concerned Nabokov's meditation on death and birth and how alike they are. He talked about how strange it is that before we are born, we aren't missed because we aren't yet there. He goes into the feeling of thinking about this in a dreamlike manner and there are several dreamy passages throughout the book. I agree it was his best one. Thinking about him reading a corny dream book and being taken in by it a bit humanizes him. Great article.
- River-Horse, William Least-Heat Moon. It's a wonderful account of a classically idiosyncratic journey from the Atlantic to the Pacific, through the waterways of North America.
Speak, Memory, Vladimir Nabokov. The pinnacle of the memoirist's art. I find it nearly uncreditable, Nabokov's facility with English, his 5th language.
Lyonesse, Jack Vance. Vance is the greatest stylist in 20th century American letters, and Lyonesse is probably his greatest achievement. Fantasy indebted to Celtic mythology, not Tolkien. Marvelous, poetic, pungent language in service of a wonderful story.
- Next on my reading list I would like to read some Vladimir Nabokov since I've never read any of his work. Has anyone else here read any of his books?
I read a lot of Nabokov beginning in high school and continuing into my university studies (when I was initially a Russian language major). Nabokov is very interesting to read. I like Speak, Memory
http://www.amazon.com/Speak-Memory-Everymans-Library-Cloth/d...
and his essays on literary criticism (which I'm not turning up just now as I do an Amazon search, but which you should be able to find in a library). I'm not such a big fan of his most famous novel, Lolita. I read it once and have never reread it.
