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

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tearing the banknote into little pieces and destroying
his
wrist-watch).
The incidents after his suicide also smack of irony,
and again he seems to be aware of it and slightly hurt.
The dramatic circumstances which accompanied his last
moment, that "delightful vibrating sound behind... me"
after the shot, "the warble of water, a throaty gush-
ing noise" (28), are explained away all too prosaical-
ly: it was only the pitcher that his bullet hit and
smashed. If he felt "unbelievably free" (27) during
his last moments and convinced that nothing mattered
any more, he finds that this was another mistake on
his part. Everything matters, just as before. The world
closes in on him again. Even as a ghost he has to be
practical. His watch has to be repaired, he needs
money, he needs a job. He is not free at all, but finds
himself (or, in his opinion, his thought) engaged as
always in "a sphere where everything is interconnected"
(31), and in a world which, he feels, might have strongly
objected had he given in to his lawless impulses (27)
inspired by that exalted feeling of freedom.
The worst ironic slight, of course, is that nobody
but himself believes in his death. The only sympathetic
comment comes from Weinstock: "You look awful", which
he attributes to the "grippe" (32), and this must be
rather disconcerting for someone who is convinced that
1.
he is stone-dead and no more than a ghost.
It is, to say the least, rather unusual to be
talked to by a narrator of whom one is pretty sure that
he is as alive as can be, but who seems to believe