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Conclusion
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223 Conclusion h Honor, glory, love for the homeland, respect for individuality, his own and another’s, courage, trustworthiness are “big words” in the mouths of those who view the possession of these virtues as public merit and loud distinction. For [V. D.] Nabokov, they were as natural as sight and hearing, as his right hand and left hand. [ . . .] With no hackneyed, lofty phrases, yet without hesitation, he was guided by reason, conscience, and the instinct of unostentatious knighthood. Such was he at the initial choice of his path in life, moving away from the wide and easy road, which the advantages of birth and of his prominent individual qualities unfolded before him. And so he perished, dashing toward inevitable death, unarmed, moved only by the instantaneous imperative feeling—to stop the evil and vile deed. And this marvelous impulse, seemingly so unexpected in the measured, always even-tempered Nabokov, with his articulate speech and refined, artless gestures, in essence determined and concluded with one lightning stroke the entire enormous magnitude and entire internal beauty of his historical fine figure. —Alexander Kuprin1 1. «Честь, подвиг, любовь к родине, уважение к своей и чужой личности, сме лость, верность слову являются «высокими словами» в устах людей, ставящих себе в публичную заслугу и в громкое отличие обладание этими достоинствами. Для Набо кова они были естественны,как зрение и слух,как собственная—правая и левая—рука. [ . . .] Без обыденно-пышных фраз, но и без колебаний шел он туда, куда его влекли разум,совесть и инстинкт непоказного рыцарства.Таков он был при начальном выборе своего жизненного пути,отойдя далеко в сторону от широкой и легкой дороги,которую развертывали перед ним преимущества рода и личных крупных качеств.Так он и погиб, кинувшись навстречу неизбежной смерти, безоружный, движимый лишь мгновенным повелительным чувством—помешать злому и гадкому делу. И этот чудесный порыв, как будто столь неожиданный для размеренного, всегда уравновешенного Набокова, с его чеканной речью и изысканно простыми жестами—в сущности, определил и закон чил одним молниеносным штрихом весь громадный рост и всю внутреннюю красоту его исторической прекрасной фигуры»; Kuprin, “V. D. Nabokov,” 355–56. 224 • The Tender Friendship and the Charm of Perfect Accord I am sure that had he caught me out in physical cowardice he would have laid a curse on me. —Vladimir Nabokov, The Gift In this book, I have examined the various ways in which Nabokov’s personality and worldview were affected by his father. To be sure, their lives were different in so many ways. Nabokov lived to the rather advanced age of seventy-eight and died of natural causes, whereas his father was cut down in the prime of life, shortly before his fifty-second birthday. Nabokov attained enormous success as a world-famous writer, whereas his father, who steadfastly toiled to create a democratic Russia, only witnessed his life’s work destroyed by the Bolshevik usurpation of power, his own name and accomplishments gradually relegated into undeserved oblivion from which history only recently has begun extricating him. Different as their lives were, they were at the same time kindred in a great variety of ways. Like his father, Nabokov loved literature and became a man of letters, excelling in fiction rather than in legal, political, and journalistic prose. Like his father, Nabokov was an educator, although V. D. Nabokov’s teaching career lasted merely eight years and was terminated due to his opposition to tsarist regime policies, whereas Nabokov had a long and prolific academic career in the United States, his newly adopted country, at Stanford, Wellesley, Harvard, and Cornell. Like his father, Nabokov was a cultural ambassador of sorts between the Russian and Western—specifically Englishspeaking —worlds.V.D.Nabokov reviewed books on law written in German, English, and French; lectured and wrote about belles lettres, particularly his beloved Dickens; and familiarized his fellow Russians with the state of affairs in the fine arts, theater, and music in wartime England and France. After being forced into exile, he enlightened the English-reading audience about the situation in the civil war–torn Russia; later in Berlin,he commented on world politics and surveyed noteworthy events in literature, the fine arts, theater, and music. In his turn, Nabokov extensively rendered German, French, and English verses into Russian and translated into English an impressive corpus of Russian poetry and prose, most notably Eugene Onegin, at the same time supplying Pushkin’s magnum opus with thorough and copious commentary. Also worthy of note are Nabokov’s seminal lecture (in French) on Pushkin, commemorating the centenary of the poet’s death; his monograph on Gogol ; and his Cornell lectures (in English) on Russian and Western literature. [18.206.13.112] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 15:18 GMT) Conclusion • 225 Further, as I have shown in the preceding pages, V. D. Nabokov was a Renaissance man: alongside his legal and political career, Vladimir Dmitrievich was an exceptional cognoscente of literature, theater, painting, and music; a passionate lover of butterflies and chess, and a devoted athlete. And so was Nabokov. Like his father, who lectured and wrote essays on literature, Nabokov exhibited scholarly prowess in literary criticism by way of lectures, articles, books, and commentaries. V. D. Nabokov’s enthusiasm for painting, landscapes in particular, presumably was one of the motivations for the young Nabokov’s desire to become a landscape painter.Vladimir Dmitrievich’s passion for theater transformed and evolved in his son into a knack for dramaturgy: Nabokov wrote a large...