Despair - Vladimir Nabokov

This post has 16 comments with rating of 5/516

• 
  edbroadway
  May 3rd, 2019
  

  

  the first Nabokov novel i read and definitely, so far ahead of its time in style, inventiveness and to think it was written originally in the 30’s in Russian. English not even Nabokov’s first or even 2nd language smh, but his third and writes with better grasp and style than 90 percent of its native tongued writers. re read that and let it sink…

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  caesar963
  May 3rd, 2019
  

  

  This cheers me up, no end!
  I’ve often thought that Russia produced the greatest writers - well, perhaps now that I think of it, those damned clever Irish people can stake a valid claim.

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  pryderi
  May 3rd, 2019
  

  

  I’ve always felt singularly blessed that the first Nabokov I read wasn’t one of the Big Three: when I finished Laughter in the Dark, I knew that there was even better to come.
  Writers who flourish outside their native language are certainly interesting. Joseph Conrad wrote a very distinctive English, though my personal favourite linguistic exile is Charles D’Orleans, who was captured at Agincourt and - when his family wouldn’t ransom him - wrote some rather good Middle English lyric poems.

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  jonesinfrance
  May 3rd, 2019
  

  Thank you!

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  joeyplank
  May 3rd, 2019
  

  

  Thanks so much for the uploads. Please feel engulfed in gratitude. You’ve helped hours of happiness enter my life. Hooray.

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  edbroadway
  May 4th, 2019
  

  caesar963 Irish/English writers rank a dueling second (Joyce,Dickens,Hardy,Forster etc yikes! Russians one, they own far too many positions in top top ranks of the greatest books of all times lists of all prestigious literary critique publications on persons.

  joeyplank that was and is exactly my aim. Happiness shared, and great literature to elevate the reading taste of a few my fellow Americans lol.

  jonesinfrance you very welcome

  pryderi well you should feel that way, my first was neither of the big three as well, and i was told as i will now tell you: “have a natural ‘tuning fork’ and taste for finding and recognizing good work. yes poor D’Orleans just like Nabokov write in a sort of courtly fashion, due to their aristocratic super education and class, both also suffering of 2 Patriarchal losses (their fathers both assassinated and the other being exile from their fatherland) sum all this up and you have two men with beautiful minds and a heavy hearts on fire; perfect conditions that ignite imagination, passion, and the need to express it. Hence their masterpieces. Pain and anger make sh*t happen lol.

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  simbad55
  May 25th, 2019
  

  New for me, many thanks for upload.

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  andrel
  May 28th, 2019
  

  @edbroadway needs to stop spreading misinformation.

  Nabokov’s native language (language spoken in one’s country) is Russian, because that is where he was born, but his mother tongue (first language) was English. He spoke English as a baby and had an English governess who taught him to read and write in English. His parents, who could speak Russian, French, and English, in that order, spoke only English to him as a child, and prohibited their servants from speaking any other language around him. At the age of five, before he could speak or read Russian, his governess began to teach him French. It is only after understanding the world in English, and learning French, that he went on to learn his native language, Russian.

  It is also worth noting that Nabokov also lived in Germany for several years, but learnt to speak only a handful of words.

  You can read more about this in Speak, Memory.

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  lisakirstin
  June 12th, 2019
  

  @ pryderi and @ edbroadway what are your favorite novels by VN? and which one should i start with?

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  edbroadway
  December 9th, 2019
  

  @andrel Just now saw your msg! sorry! Yes I read Speak,Memory where he claims to have learn to SPEAK English first, but there is plenty of contradictory information and even evidence that was how can I phrase it, an in-complete truth. It is In Speak, Memory itself where he clearly calls English his second ‘native tongue’, despite through self admission he said “Gradually, French and Russian superceded English in his studies” but his ‘second
  native language’ did not disappear from his life. Russian aristocracy was fluent in French at that time and it’s been said that the youth spoke better French than Russian. His favorite and Wealthy uncle who left him the huge inheritance taken by the Bolshevists, ONLY spoke French. Yes he spoke English, as young child and read it at that level, but he DID NOT WRITE it at all in childhood, it was parasable at best in Late adolescence and He did not learn to write it with command until while studying at Cambridge, where the self-proclaimed “English child” was “reminded he was undeniably Russian.” Nabokov also writes in SPEAK,MM that he “discovered all the Anglophilism of his family was no help: the
  Englishness of his childhood was something belonging to the nursery” (Boyd, 167) By the way by cognitive psychology/Neurolinguistics etc. Your true ‘native’ tongue or dominant language, [like we have dominant handedness ( righty or lefty)], is the language you speak and hear predominantly more of in your dreaming mind. I can attest to this being a quadrilingual myself or a ‘polyglot’ a word I did not want to use for fear as coming off as a pretentious a-hole. Although the world has seen more than one multilingual writer, seated among
  the best and most successful of that rare genus/species is V Nabokov. Steven Pinker, The Late Umberto Eco a preeminent philologist himself, are two of many Linguistic scientists that agreed on and mention this as part of his genius.

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  LordDerka
  June 27th, 2020
  

  Seed?

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  henrypursner
  February 25th, 2022
  

  Please seed. Thank you in advance

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  Lonerrrr
  October 25th, 2022
  

  Thank you.

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  fooooooo314
  November 2nd, 2023
  

  Please seed.

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  gweeps
  July 30th, 2024
  

  

  Thanks for seeding!

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov
• 
  NadiaG123
  February 16th, 2025
  

  seed please

  Despair - Vladimir Nabokov

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