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

-
222
-
for the overall comic effect of the work (in spite
of the poem which is on the whole serious and in
parts quite solemn). At the centre of this is, of
course, Kinbote, the bungling and bad scholar.
Bad scholars provoke Nabokov to fiercer comments
than bad writers. He is indifferent to criticism of
his literary work, but to be accused, or even only
suspected, of bad scholarship incenses him.
He is moved by incompetent criticism of his translation
and edition of Eugene Onegin to write a scorching
Reply to My Critics15, and in it he refutes "practically
every item of criticism in [Mr Wilson's]
enormous piece"16, proving throughout with scorn and
glee and irony that the results of his own scrupulous
painstaking scholarly work can not be overthrown
by someone like Wilson, who is content with using
"fairly comprehensive" dictionaries17 and betrays
throughout his critical essay a "mixture of pompous
aplomb and peevish ignorance. "18 - "Some lone, hoarse
voice must be raised", he says, "to defend
...
the
helpless dead poet"19, and he writes an equally
scorching critique of W. Arndt's translation and edition
of Eugene Onegin. Arndt undertakes the task in
Nabokov's view not only with an inadequate knowledge
of Russian and as a result confuses words and meanings20,
but, like Wilson, betrays his ignorance on
so many points that Nabokov can easily prove his edition
to be full of errors and mistakes and howlers.
A scholarly work, like the edition of some author's
masterpiece, "... possesses an ethical side, moral