Vera (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov): A Biography"At once a love story, a portrait of a marriage, and an answer to a riddle, Vera (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov) explores a remarkable literary partnership - that of a woman who devoted her life to her husband's art and a man who dedicated his works to his wife. Open a volume of Nabokov's, and there is Vera on the dedication page, front and center. But search for her elsewhere, and the woman to whom the author of Lolita was married for fifty-two years, who carried on his correspondence in his name, fades from view." "Stacy Schiff has now restored her to life. Schiff follows Vera Nabokov from her affluent St. Petersburg childhood, through the dramatic escape from Bolshevik Russia, to the streets of Weimar Berlin, where Vera makes a spectacular entrance into the life of her future husband, then a gifted but struggling writer of Russian verse. In the three decades that pass before he metamorphoses into the celebrated author of Lolita, Vera proves to be nothing less than his full creative partner. She had a need to do something great with her life. And as he made clear from the start, her husband had a very great need of her. Publishers, relatives, colleagues, agreed: "He would have been nowhere without her."" "She transcribed her memories of their son's early days go that Nabokov could draw on them for Speak, Memory. She was at all times his first reader, his memory, his foil, his muse. She corrected his stories in German, his memoir in French, his poetry in Italian - and translated Pale Fire into Russian when in her eighties. Through it all, she proved a woman of uncanny wisdom, a conventional wife with a splendidly unconventional mind."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved |
Contents
PETERSBURG 3848 | 3 |
THE ROMANTIC AGE | 36 |
THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS | 71 |
Copyright | |
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American Anna Feigin Appel April asked August Bakhm Berkman Berlin Bishop Boyd archive Boyd interview butterfly Cornell couple Crespi December Dmitri early Elena Levin émigré English Epstein Ergaz Evsei February February 26 felt French friends German girls Girodias Goldenweiser Guadanini husband interview with VéN Irina Ithaca Jan Parker January January 15 Jason Epstein Jewish July June Karpovich knew later lectures Lena letter literature Lolita manuscript March marriage Massalsky Minton months Montreux mother never Nigel Nicolson novel November November 22 October October 25 Pale Fire Paris Petersburg Pnin poem proved publisher Review Russian Russian Literature September Shakhovskoy Sirin sister Slonim Sonia story student summer thing tion translation trip VéN to HS Véra Nabokov Véra Slonim Véra's Vladimir Nabokov VN to Hessen VN to VéN VN to Wilson VN's weeks Weidenfeld Wellesley wife woman word write York