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/lit/ - Literature

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File: 181 KB, 600x958, Lolita.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
4486134 No.4486134[DELETED]  [Reply] [Original]

This is beautiful. But, could someone explain his beef with Dostoevsky?

>> No.4486194

>NABOCOUGH
>NOT SHIT

>> No.4486205

>>4486134
You mean when Nabokov called him a pre-Freudian thinker, or something like that? I'd like to know too.

>> No.4486208

bump of interest

>> No.4486216

>that cover art

>> No.4486219

what beef

>> No.4486237

Because Dostoevsky's mostly respected by English readers rather than Russian ones, and he dislikes his simplistic thematics and morals.

>> No.4486272

>>4486237
But didn't Nabokov write Lolita in English first, then Russian?

>> No.4486275

Dosty isn't as insecure as nabokov, his works carry a greater degree of philosophical, political, and theological importance and thought, and he creates more interesting and complex characters

>> No.4486278

>>4486272
Doesn't change the fact that he's Russian.

>> No.4486297

>>4486278
>The oak is a tree. The rose is a flower. The deer is an animal. The sparrow is a bird. Russia is our fatherland. Death is inevitable.

>> No.4486327

>>4486216
This, holy shit.

>> No.4486334

>>4486216
This is so much better than putting a loli on the cover. What version is that? Image search on google didn't show anything useful.

>> No.4486535
File: 467 KB, 600x937, lolita-book-cover.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
4486535

>>4486334
This one? I was never a fan of this either; it's just a bit too... straightforward. Screams "I'm an edgy guy reading an edgy book about PEDOPHILIA," you know? My version has a close up of a girl's lips on it and I feel the same way about that one. It just makes me feel sort of skeevy. OP's cover is master race.

and maybe it's just me but it looks like an abstraction of a girl's thighs in blue underpants

>> No.4486548

>>4486535
That must be it, there is no other way around.
Someone please tell me where can I found the book with OP's cover, I couldn't find it on book depository.

>> No.4486562
File: 796 KB, 1461x2244, 9780241953242.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]
4486562

pic related is my shit-tier cover

>> No.4486587

>>4486548
http://www.printmag.com/illustration/recovering-lolita/
Seems like it isn't in print, unfortunately

>> No.4486605

>>4486587
That's a shame. Thanks for finding it anon.

>> No.4486614

Daily reminder that Nabokov got #rekt by Sartre via mutually catty book reviews, despite the fact that Sartre wasn't primarily a fiction writer.

>> No.4486652

>>4486614
I imagine the thing that is ultimately more #reckting is that Nabakov produced one of the best novels of his time, and Sarte produced shit like Nausea.

>> No.4487303

>>4486535
>and maybe it's just me but it looks like an abstraction of a girl's thighs in blue underpants
of fucking course thats what it is

>> No.4487305

Well when you want to be considered the best Russian writer ever, are you going to praise your competition? Of course not. He was just trying to market himself when he said bad things about Dostoevsky. "Pick me! I am the better Russian!!"

>> No.4487315

>My position in regard to Dostoevsky is a curious and difficult one. In all my courses I approach literature from the only point of view that literature interests me-namely the point of view of enduring art and individual genius. From this point of view Dostoevsky is not a great writer, but a rather mediocre one-with flashes of excellent humor, but, alas, with wastelands of literary platitudes in between.

>A good third [of readers] do not know the difference between real literature and pseudo-literature, and to such readers Dostoevsky may seem more important and more artistic than such trash as our American historical novels or things called From Here to Eternity and such like balderdash.

>> No.4487948

>>4487315
Russian emigreé disses homeland's literature.
So edgy and original.

>> No.4488139

>>4487948
>you can't not like writers if they are from your native country

He lavished lots of praise on other Russia writers.

You're the only edgy kid here, who has to use shitty buzzwords because you're an unoriginal fagget

>> No.4488202

>>4487315
from here to eternity is a shit book

>> No.4488219

>>4486562
i have the same one its okey

>> No.4488451

>>4487315
>A good third [of readers] do not know the difference between real literature and pseudo-literature
Such a shitty argument.

>> No.4488544

>>4488451
>implying he isn't right

>> No.4489961

nabokov hated reading.

literally every book is a "wasteland of platitudes with flashes of excellent humor here and there." every book ever. you know its true

>> No.4489967

>>4487315
yeah this sums it up

basically nabokov's beef is that dosto wasn't a great stylist. he believed style/structure was what gave "enduring art and individual genius". dosto's appeal is, in a large part, as a sort of philosopher-novelist. nabokov didn't like philosopher-novelists.

i think nabokov is pretty plainly wrong here, though he still is right to say dosto isn't a good stylist.

>> No.4489992

It's a class thing. Dosty was to rough for nabokov who could only deal with things elliptically

>> No.4490303

>>4486297
>most Russian post that isn't actually in Cyrillic script/10

>> No.4491673

>>4489967
This makes sense to me, considering that his favorite 20th-century novelists were Joyce and Proust, both of whom were consummate stylists. (This may be subjective, but they read that way to me.)

Style is also very difficult to translate, so that may be why he contrasts Dostoyevsky's standing in Russia with that abroad.

>> No.4491689

you guys won't really understand his viewpoints on dosto mainly because

1) you haven't read enough russian literature
2) you haven't read enough nabokov
3) you haven't read enough dostoevsky
4) you don't know russian
5) you haven't read enough literature

of course, he can pointlessly try to explain alien concepts to foreigners, like in his "lectures on russian literatures," but the non-russian reader will only grasp the meaning of his affirmations, not the essence

>> No.4491702

>>4491689
except it's not russians who view dostoevsky as the most significant russian author

>> No.4491761

>>4491689
That's a whole load of assumptions.

>> No.4491793

>>4491689

Nabokov was a sadist aesthete. Like Proust, only lacking Proust's overall profundity.

He was an incredibly fickle and morally disconnected man who really only ever cared about the aesthetic. Take his criticisms on art with an island of salt.

>> No.4491842

is it nah-buh-kov or nah-BOW-kov??

>> No.4491846

>>4486216
could almost fap to that...

>> No.4491900

>>4486275
>implying any character is more complex than lolita

>> No.4491910

>>4491842
>nah-buh-kov
This one.

>> No.4491948

>>4491842
vla-DI-mir nah-BOH-kov

the boh is pronounced like boulder, but more staccatto, also this is the syllable that is stressed in his surname.

>> No.4491953

>>4486134
Nabokov is interested in writing and promoting literature that is an end in itself. By that I mean literature of rich language and observation unconcerned with anything other than being moving and beautiful. Sometimes ethics (Lolita), politics (Bend Sinister), and other things are incorporated, but they are means to those ends.
Dostoevsky, in Nabokov's view, uses literature as a means of illustration and argument for philosophical and political ends. Nabokov also finds his engagement with the existential problems to be tired, using a lot of dramatic set-pieces of Russian literature.

>> No.4492054

>>4491948
how can people not pronounce this? it's literally phonetic

>> No.4492092

>>4492054

Different languages have different guidelines for accenting. I bet even some other Slavs would say it differently.

>> No.4492508

>>4486205
Actually, thats pretty astute. Dostoevsky was very influenced by Nietsche, and all of his characters are very much dealing with the failure of reason and the death of god, but they never seem libidinous or human. just broken machines.

>> No.4492515

>>4492508
>Dostoevsky was very influenced by Nietzsche
You've got that backwards.

>> No.4492541

>>4492508
>all of his characters are very much dealing with the failure of reason and the death of god, but they never seem libidinous or human
Goofed this up too.