Nabokov’s Unfinished Novel Available (as Vlad rolls in his grave)
13.11.09
In the latest Bookforum there’s an article about the resurrected last novel of Vladamir Nabokov, a book he meant never to be published, if he died before finishing it, that is. But of course his wish goes against the wishes of his fans, and alas we now have it in our possession. I wonder, with modern technology, yikes, what all stuff writers really never meant to have published will be unearthed from their quickly typed emails, IM chats, scrap digital thoughts, credit card receipts and so on. The literary biographer these days will have much less room to fudge and embellish that’s for sure. Is one’s reality as black and white a culmination of all that gets typed (and filmed and recorded), some mere formations of thought, the muck before the edited classic is allowed to be published? Oh well, whatever, Nabokov has no say in this, so read this review and then get yourself a copy of The Original of Laura.
