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

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a Beheading the comic elements have a double function.
The same comic devices that deepen by contrast the
depressing or the frightening sides of things also
expose these same things, stress their absurdity, and
hold them up to ridicule. For examples of this one
needs only look at the political systems and some of
the laws in Bend Sinister and Invitation to a Beheading.
"... the utterly nonsensical is a natural and logical
part of Paduk's rule" (BS, 78), old Maximov, who
proves to be so much more clairvoyant with regard to
Paduk than Krug, "the thinker" (BS, 168), neatly summarizes
the total impression one gets when one looks
at the various features of this rule and of the state,
and old Maximov's words also apply to the state and
the laws in Invitation to a Beheading.
The utterly nonsensical shows for example in a
certain "amusing new law" (BS, 159) that concerns
public transport and that, instead of having positive
effects, as a good law should, only serves to create
complete chaos and confusion. It shows in the episode
on the bridge, which, although one is acutely aware
of Krug's desperate state of mind all the time, is
nevertheless comic. In a series of incidents, it demonstrates
the total absence of sense both in the
regulations devised by the ruler and in the heads of
the soldiers, who are clearly expected to maintain
law and order but are just as clearly not intelligent
enough to deal with even so uncomplicated a problem
as someone wishing to cross the bridge. Officious but
illiterate, they almost manage to realize for Krug