Announcing the Vladimir Nabokov Reading Project

Le tout Manchester is reading celebrated Russo-American writer, Vladimir Nabokov. Le tout being, well, my neighbour, Ben, and John at the Cornerhouse (both Pale Fire), and Dr Biswell (Pnin). As a service to readers, The Manual is embarking on the Vladimir Nabokov Reading Project. Full attention will ensure that reader will be able to hold their own in literary conversations across the North West. This service is vitally needed as due to shortages of Pale Fire at Waterstone's, Mancunians were left without the supply of linguistic wonders which, delicate things that they are, is as vital to their lives as premium gin and cheap red wine.

First up is Pnin. The rest will follow, but The Real Life of Sebastian Knight will have to wait till I get my copy back from Luke. If you want to know more about Vladimir Nabokov or buy the books, you know were Wikipedia and Amazon are to be found. Better resources may follow as the project continues.

Pnin by Vladimir Nabokov

With Pnin we are introduced to Russian émigré, Timofey Pnin. Tenuously untenured at a New England college, he muddles through 1950s America with a variety of English all of his own. Mocked and loved on campus in equal measure, he has an acute sense of the ridiculous of the world and of himself. For Pnin sorrow is "the only thing in the world people really possess" and his planned courses will show that "the history of man is the history of pain". Alongside these bleak courseplans, we are treated two parties, a former wife convinced of her own glamour, the visit of her insular, wunderkind son, and Pnin's wonderful driving. As with much of Nabokov, there are dopelgangers aplenty causing Pnin (and us) to ask which is the genuine article. Anyone who knows himself to be fallible and slightly absurd will love Pnin, and will be grateful to Nabokov for making this invention a reality.

More blogs on Pnin

Read about Jim Story's encounter with a real life Pnin.