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| Hearsay: |
Nabokov’s heir holds the unstruck match over the final unpublished manuscript of his great father. The debate has been raging for years, most recently on the web, including here at Bookninja where I was taken to task for saying “burn it”.
Now the Times solicits opinions from two giants of literature. Save it, says John Banville:
That Nabokov, before he died, did not destroy what he had written of his final novel is surely an indication that he wanted it to live; likewise, Véra Nabokov, the most vigilant keeper of the flame of her husband’s writings, let the fragment survive, so she too must have thought it worth preserving. If I were Dmitri Nabokov, which thank goodness I am not, I would have the fragment typed up and given to two or three reputable and sympathetic critics – eg, James Wood, Harold Bloom – and perhaps also a writer or two – John Updike, Martin Amis – for their opinion on whether it should be published.
Burn it, says Tom Stoppard:
It’s perfectly straightforward: Nabokov wanted it burnt, so burn it. There is no superior imperative. The argument about saving it for the “greater good” of the literary world is null, as far as I’m concerned. There are parallel universes, might-have-been worlds, full of lost works, and no doubt some of them would have been masterpieces. But our desire to possess them all is just a neurosis, a completeness complex, as though we must have everything that’s going and it’s a tragedy if we don’t. It’s nonsense, an impossible desire for absoluteness.
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February 14th, 2008 at 9:06 am
Has Dmitri read it, and did he think it was any good?
February 14th, 2008 at 10:21 am
It’s wretched enough to contemplate your impending death, but it makes it so much worse if you are robbed in your final days of whatever power remains to you to make your own decisions. The manuscript was Nabokov’s own property, to do with as he wished. Respect the man’s decision, I say. As I understand it, he had his wits about him when he made the request. Countless works of art through history have been destroyed by their creators for any number of reasons, and who are we to question their motives? Any decent artist edits himself, and any artist knows how it is to have made something he thinks should not go out in the world, because it is incomplete, or not up to standard, or too revealing. Why should Nabokov be denied the right to do this? Dmitri Nabokov has made this so much more difficult than it needed to be. He should have quietly, and privately, destroyed his father’s manuscript as he was asked to do. Simple as that.
February 14th, 2008 at 10:41 am
I agree, Alex. But the cynic in me can’t help thinking that things might already be decided, and all this is just the longest, most underhanded pre-pub publicity campaign in history.
February 14th, 2008 at 12:49 pm
Quite possibly. Either way, the “will I, won’t I” tease is a distasteful manipulation that has gone on way too long. I have no sympathy for the son and his supposedly difficult decision.
February 14th, 2008 at 1:11 pm
George, i never looked at it like that. Here i was, being naive, thinking the guy really needed some guidance. Alex, i agree, that the manipulation is distasteful, the guy should do his deciding in private, or with close friends, not with the world involved. The more people involved, the more complicated the decision becomes.
February 14th, 2008 at 3:34 pm
Oh, god, I’m with Alex. I am tired of this topic. Dmitri, just burn that puppy or publish it already. Did he not know about this fragment until just recently? Has he not had a long enough time to think about it? Or is this just some distasteful ploy to drum up interest for when they do publish? Can’t say I think much of Banville’s idea. I guess I know what he’s going for but I certainly wouldn’t want to leave my reading choices up to Harold Bloom and Martin Amis. It’s too horrible to contemplate.
February 15th, 2008 at 6:23 am
But is it straight forward,Tom? What was his state of mind when he said “Burn it”? There is reason to think he said it while delirious.
On the other hand what are we saving? Not a novel, a few cards that he would have shuffled into a different order and which probably represent one fortieth of the novel he would have written. Just enough for a few academics to get their teeth into and a few students to work up into a thesis, maybe a doctorate or two.
I have discussed it at greater length on my blog, so will leave it at that for now.
February 20th, 2008 at 11:01 am
What if Max Brod had carried out Kafka’s wish that his manuscripts be destroyed after his death? The world would have very little of Kafka’s work. I say don’t burn it.
February 20th, 2008 at 3:54 pm
Nabokov, unlike Kafka, published a lot of books in his lifetime. This mystery ms. is a small percentage of his body of work. We can live without it.
February 20th, 2008 at 11:28 pm
If the teeth-gnashing over this fragment is truly not a pre-pub publicity stunt,
then perhaps Dmitri should publish it on the web, for all to see and read freely,
rather than profit from something that his father wanted burnt,
for fear that it would embarass him after he was dead.
I find that kind of self-absorbed perfectionism to be wussy. When I was getting my MFA,
some of the other MFA students considered not turning in their theses
because they would be preserved in the U of Iowa library system,
and they might be embarassed by their juvenalia
when they were great and accomplished writers.
Dmitri: for those of us who love to be readers
let us have it.
TK Kenyon