''Vladimir Nabokov's Comic Quest for Reality' - Nottingham eTheses

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with contemporary and social problems which have no
place in a work of art:
0, I know the type, the dreary type!
He likes a good yarn spiced with social
comment; he likes to recognize his own
thoughts and throes in those of the
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author;...
Mr Goodman stands condemned not only by V but by
Nabokov himself, whereas Sebastian, through an ironi-
cal twist, emerges from behind Mr Goodman's hilarious
biography as resembling Nabokov in at least one respect.
What it is, however, that occupied Sebastian in-
stead of what Mr Goodman thinks ought to have occupied
him, is still unknown. Furthermore, with not only the
environmental method so clearly parodied and exposed
as lending itself to abuses, but that method too,
which relies on an author's work for material, the
question arises how one can trust anyone talking about,
and interpreting, an author's work. How, if this way,
too, is barred, can one hope to get through to the
reality of an author? How far, to return to The Real
Life of Sebastian Knight, can one trust V's explica-
tion of Sebastian's novels? His comments on the books
and on Sebastian differ vastly from those of Mr Good-
man, and he leaves no doubt about what one should
think of the rival biographer and his product. But
Stegner says about V that he is "suspect as a narrator,
worshipping as he does the subject of his quest. When
he talks to people who have kndwn Sebastian, he only
listens to what he wants to hear.,,
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He has also made
himself suspect, as has been seen, through speculating
about his brother's life and thoughts. Like Goodman,