The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov

by Vladimir Nabokov

  At last came the day when the first draft of the novel was finished. To his friend’s suggestion that they repair to a café, Ilya Borisovich replied in a mysterious and weighty tone of voice, “Impossible. I’m polishing my phrasing.”

  The polishing consisted of his launching an attack on the too frequently occurring adjective molodaya, “young” (feminine gender), replacing it here and there by “youthful,” yunaya, which he pronounced with a provincial doubling of the consonant as if it were spelled yunnaya.

  One day later. Twilight. Café on Kurfürstendamm. Settee of red plush. Two gentlemen. To a casual eye: businessmen. One—respectable-looking, even rather majestic, a nonsmoker, with an expression of trust and kindliness on his fleshy face; the other—lean, beetle-browed, with a pair of fastidious folds descending from his triangular nostrils to the lowered corners of his mouth from which protrudes obliquely a cigarette not yet lit. The first man’s quiet voice: “I penned the end in one spurt. He dies, yes, he dies.”

  Silence. The red settee is nice and soft. Beyond the picture window a transluscent tram floats by like a bright fish in an aquarium tank.

  Euphratski clicked his cigarette lighter, expulsed smoke from his nostrils, and said, “Tell me, Ilya Borisovich, why not have a literary magazine run it as a serial before it comes out in book form?”

  “But, look, I’ve no pull with that crowd. They publish always the same people.”

  “Nonsense. I have a little plan. Let me think it over.”

  “I’d be happy.…” murmured Tal dreamily.

  A few days later in I. B. Tal’s room at the office. The unfolding of the little plan.

  “Send your thing” (Euphratski narrowed his eyes and lowered his voice) “to Arion.”

  “Arion? What’s that?” said I.B., nervously patting his manuscript.

  “Nothing very frightening. It’s the name of the best émigré review. You don’t know it? Ay-ya-yay! The first number came out this spring, the second is expected in the fall. You should keep up with literature a bit closer, Ilya Borisovich!”

  “But how to contact them? Just mail it?”

  “That’s right. Straight to the editor. It’s published in Paris. Now don’t tell me you’ve never heard Galatov’s name?”

  Guiltily Ilya Borisovich shrugged one fat shoulder. Euphratski, his face working wryly, explained: a writer, a master, new form of the novel, intricate construction, Galatov the Russian Joyce.

  “Djoys,” meekly repeated Ilya Borisovich after him.

  “First of all have it typed,” said Euphratski. “And for God’s sake acquaint yourself with the magazine.”

  He acquainted himself. In one of the Russian bookshops of exile he was handed a plump pink volume. He bought it, thinking aloud, as it were: “Young venture. Must be encouraged.”

  “Finished, the young venture,” said the bookseller. “One number was all that came out.”

  “You are not in touch,” rejoined Ilya Borisovich with a smile. “I definitively know that the next number will be out in autumn.”

  Upon coming home, he took an ivory paperknife and neatly cut the magazine’s pages. Therein he found an unintelligible piece of prose by Galatov, two or three short stories by vaguely familiar authors, a mist of poems, and an extremely capable article about German industrial problems signed Tigris.

  Oh, they’ll never accept it, reflected Ilya Borisovich with anguish. They all belong to one crew.

  Nevertheless he located one Madame Lubansky (“stenographer and typist”) in the advertisement columns of a Russian-language newspaper and, having summoned her to his apartment, started to dictate with tremendous feeling, boiling with agitation, raising his voice—and glancing ever and again at the lady to see her reaction to his novel. Her pencil kept flitting as she bent over her writing pad—a small, dark woman with a rash on her forehead—and Ilya Borisovich paced his study in circles, and the circles would tighten around her at the approach of this or that spectacular passage. Toward the end of the first chapter the room vibrated with his cries.

  “And his entire yore seemed to him a horrible error,” roared Ilya Borisovich, and then added, in his ordinary office voice, “Type this out for tomorrow, five copies, wide margins, I shall expect you here at the same hour.”

  That night, in bed, he kept thinking up what he would tell Galatov when sending the novel (“… awaiting your stern judgment … my contributions have appeared in Russia and America.…”), and on the following morning—such is the enchanting obligingness of fate—Ilya Borisovich received this letter from Paris:

  Dear Boris Grigorievich,

  I learn from a common friend that you have completed a new opus. The editorial board of Arion would be interested in seeing it, since we would like to have something “refreshing” for our next issue.

  How strange! Only the other day I found myself recalling your elegant miniatures in the Kharkov Herald!

  “I’m remembered, I’m wanted,” distractedly uttered Ilya Borisovich. Thereupon he rang up Euphratski, and throwing himself back in his armchair, sideways—with the uncouthness of triumph—leaning the hand that held the receiver upon his desk, while outlining an ample gesture with the other, and beaming all over, he drawled, “Well, oh-old boy, well, oh-old boy”—and suddenly the various bright objects upon the desk began to tremble and twin and dissolve in a moist mirage. He blinked, everything resumed its right place, and Euphratski’s languid voice replied, “Oh, come! Brother writers. Ordinary good turn.”

  Five stacks of typed pages grew higher and higher. Dolinin, who with one thing and another had not yet possessed his fair companion, happened to discover that she was infatuated with another man, a young painter. Sometimes I.B. dictated in his office, and then the German typists in the other rooms, hearing that remote roar, wondered who on earth was being bawled out by the usually good-natured boss. Dolinin had a heart-to-heart talk with Irina, she told him she would never leave him, because she prized too highly his beautiful lonely soul, but, alas, she belonged physically to another, and Dolinin silently bowed. At last, the day came when he made a will in her favor, the day came when he shot himself (with a Mauser pistol), the day came when Ilya Borisovich, smiling blissfully, asked Madame Lubansky, who had brought the final portion of the typescript, how much he owed her, and attempted to overpay.

  With ravishment he reread Lips to Lips and handed over one copy to Euphratski for corrections (some discreet editing had already been accomplished by Madame Lubansky at such points where chance omissions garbled her shorthand notes). All Euphratski did was to insert in one of the first lines a temperamental comma in red pencil. Ilya Borisovich religiously transported that comma to the copy destined for Arion, signed his novel with a pseudonym derived from “Anna” (the name of his dead wife), fastened every chapter with a trim clip, added a lengthy letter, slipped all this into a huge solid envelope, weighed it, went to the post office himself, and sent the novel by registered mail.

  With the receipt tucked away in his wallet, Ilya Borisovich braced himself for weeks and weeks of tremulous waiting. Galatov’s reply came, however, with miraculous promptness—on the fifth day.

  Dear Ilya Grigorievich,

  The editors are more than entranced with the material you sent us. Seldom have we had the occasion to peruse pages upon which a “human soul” has been so clearly imprinted. Your novel moves the reader with a face’s singular expression, to paraphrase Baratynski, the singer of the Finnish crags. It breathes “bitterness and tenderness.” Some of the descriptions, such as for example that of the theater, in the very beginning, compete with analogous images in the works of our classical writers and in a certain sense gain the ascendancy. This I say with a full awareness of the “responsibility” attached to such a statement. Your novel would have been a genuine adornment of our review.

  As soon as Ilya Borisovich had somewhat recovered his composure, he walked over to the Tiergarten—instead of riding to his office—and sat there on a park bench, tracing arc
s on the brown ground, thinking of his wife, and imagining how she would have rejoiced with him. After a while he went to see Euphratski. The latter lay in bed, smoking. They analyzed together every line of the letter. When they got to the last one, Ilya Borisovich meekly raised his eyes and asked, “Tell me, why do you think he put ‘would have been’ and not ‘will be’? Doesn’t he understand that I’m overjoyed to give them my novel? Or is it simply a stylistic device?”

  “I’m afraid there’s another reason,” answered Euphratski. “No doubt it’s a case of concealing something out of sheer pride. In point of fact the magazine is folding up—yes, that’s what I’ve just learned. The émigré public consumes as you know all sorts of trash, and Arion is meant for the sophisticated reader. Well, that’s the result.”

  “I’ve also heard rumors,” said very much perturbed Ilya Borisovich, “but I thought it was slander spread by competitors, or mere stupidity. Can it be really possible that no second issue will ever come out? It is awful!”

  “They have no funds. The review is a disinterested, idealistic enterprise. Such publications, alas, perish.”

  “But how, how can it be!” cried Ilya Borisovich, with a Russian splash-gesture of helpless dismay. “Haven’t they approved my thing, don’t they want to print it?”

  “Yes, too bad,” said Euphratski calmly. “By the way, tell me—” and he changed the subject.

  That night Ilya Borisovich did some hard thinking, conferred with his inner self, and next morning phoned his friend to submit to him certain questions of a financial nature. Euphratski’s replies were listless in tone but most accurate in sense. Ilya Borisovich pondered some more and on the following day made Euphratski an offer to be submitted to Arion. The offer was accepted, and Ilya Borisovich transferred to Paris a certain amount of money. In reply he got a letter with expressions of deep gratitude and a communication to the effect that the next issue of Arion would come out in a month’s time. A postscript contained a courteous request:

  Allow us to put, ‘a novel by Ilya Annenski,’ and not, as you suggest, ‘I. Annenski,’ otherwise there might be some confusion with the ‘last swan of Tsarskoe Selo,’ as Gumilyov calls him.

  Ilya Borisovich answered:

  Yes, of course, I just did not know that there already existed an author writing under that name. I am delighted my work will be printed. Please have the kindness to send me five specimens of your journal as soon as it is out.

  (He had in view an old female cousin and two or three business acquaintances. His son did not read Russian.)

  Here began the era in his life which the wits denoted by the term “apropos.” Either in a Russian bookshop, or at a meeting of the Friends of Expatriate Arts, or else simply on the sidewalk of a West Berlin street, you were amiably accosted (“Ah! How goes it?”) by a person you knew slightly, a pleasant and dignified gentleman wearing horn-rimmed glasses and carrying a cane, who would engage you in casual conversation about this and that, would imperceptibly pass from this and that to the subject of literature, and would suddenly say: “Apropos, here’s what Galatov writes me. Yes—Galatov. Galatov the Russian Djoys.”

  You take the letter and scan it:

  … editors are more than entranced … our classical writers … adornment of our review.

  “He got my patronymic wrong,” adds Ilya Borisovich with a kindly chuckle. “You know how writers are: absentminded! The journal will come out in September, you will read my little work.” And replacing the letter in his wallet, he takes leave of you and with a worried air hurries away.

  Literary failures, hack journalists, special correspondents of forgotten newspapers derided him with savage volupty. Such hoots are emitted by delinquents torturing a cat; such a spark glows in the eyes of a no longer young, sexually unlucky fellow telling a particularly dirty story. Naturally, it was behind his back that they jeered, but they did so with the utmost sans-gêne, disregarding the superb acoustics of every locus of tattle. Being, however, as deaf to the world as a grouse in courtship, he probably did not catch one sound of all this. He blossomed, he walked his cane with a new, novelistic stance, he started writing to his son in Russian with an interlinear German translation of most of the words. At the office one knew already that I.B. Tal was not only an excellent person but also a Schriftsteller, and some of his business friends confided their love secrets to him as themes he might use. To him, sensing a certain warm zephyr, there began to flock in, through front hall or back door, the motley mendicancy of emigration. Public figures addressed him with respect. The fact could not be denied: Ilya Borisovich was indeed surrounded by esteem and fame. Not a single party in a cultured Russian milieu passed without his name being mentioned. How it was mentioned, with what kind of snicker, hardly matters: the thing, not the way, is important, says true wisdom.

  At the end of the month Ilya Borisovich had to leave town on a tedious business trip and so he missed the advertisements in Russian-language newspapers regarding the coming publication of Arion 2. When he returned to Berlin, a large cubical package awaited him on the hallway table. Without taking his topcoat off, he instantaneously undid the parcel. Pink, plump, cool tomes. And, on the covers, ARION in purple-red letters. Six copies.

  Ilya Borisovich attempted to open one; the book crackled deliciously but refused to unclose. Blind, newborn! He tried again, and caught a glimpse of alien, alien versicles. He swung the mass of uncut pages from right to left—and happened to spot the table of contents. His eye raced through names and titles, but he was not there, he was not there! The volume endeavored to shut, he applied force, and reached the end of the list. Nothing! How could that be, good God? Impossible! Must have been omitted by chance from the table, such things happen, they happen! He was now in his study, and seizing his white knife, he stuck it into the thick, foliated flesh of the book. First Galatov, of course, then poetry, then two stories, then again poetry, again prose, and farther on nothing but trivia—surveys, critiques, and so forth. Ilya Borisovich was overwhelmed all at once by a sense of fatigue and futility. Well, nothing to be done. Maybe they had too much material. They’ll print it on the next number. Oh, that’s for certain! But a new period of waiting—Well, I’ll wait. Mechanically he kept sifting the soft pages between finger and thumb. Fancy paper. Well, I’ve been at least of some help. One can’t insist on being printed instead of Galatov or—And here, abruptly, there jumped out and whirled and went tripping, tripping along, hand on hip, in a Russian dance, the dear, heart-warm words: “… her youthful, hardly formed bosom … violins were still weeping … both little tickets … the spring night welcomed them with a car—” and on the reverse page, as inevitably as the continuation of rails after a tunnel: “essing and passionate breath of wind—”

  “How the deuce didn’t I guess immediately!” ejaculated Ilya Borisovich.

  It was entitled “Prologue to a novel.” It was signed “A. Ilyin,” with, in parentheses, “To be continued.” A small bit, three pages and a half, but what a nice bit! Overture. Elegant. “Ilyin” is better than “Annenski.” Might have been a mix-up even if they had put “Ilya Annenski.” But why “Prologue” and not simply: Lips to Lips, Chapter One? Oh, that’s quite unimportant.

  He reread the piece thrice. Then he laid the magazine aside, paced his study, whistling negligently the while, as if nothing whatever had happened: well, yes, there’s that book lying there—some book or other—who cares? Whereupon he rushed toward it and reread himself eight times in a row. Then he looked up “A. Ilyin, p. 205” in the table of contents, found p. 205, and, relishing every word, reread his “Prologue.” He kept playing that way for quite a time.

  The magazine replaced the letter. Ilya Borisovich constantly carried a copy of Arion under his arm, and upon running into any sort of acquaintance, opened the volume at a page that had grown accustomed to presenting itself. Arion was reviewed in the papers. The first of those reviews did not mention Ilyin at all. The second had: “Mr. Ilyin’s ‘Prologue to a novel’ must surel
y be a joke of some kind.” The third noted merely that Ilyin and another were newcomers to the magazine. Finally, a fourth reviewer (in a charming, modest little periodical appearing somewhere in Poland) wrote as follows: “Ilyin’s piece attracts one by its sincerity. The author pictures the birth of love against a background of music. Among the indubitable qualities of the piece one should mention the good style of the narration.” A new era started (after the “apropos” period and the book-carrying one): Ilya Borisovich would extract that review from his wallet.

  He was happy. He purchased six more copies. He was happy. Silence was readily explained by inertia, detraction by enmity. He was happy. “To be continued.” And then, one Sunday, came a telephone call from Euphratski: “Guess,” he said, “who wants to speak to you? Galatov! Yes, he’s in Berlin for a couple of days. I pass the receiver.”

  A voice never yet heard took over. A shimmering, urgeful, mellow, narcotic voice. A meeting was settled.

  “Tomorrow at five at my place,” said Ilya Borisovich, “what a pity you can’t come tonight!”

  “Very regrettable,” rejoined the shimmering voice; “you see, I’m being dragged by friends to attend The Black Panther—terrible play—but it’s such a long time since I’ve seen dear Elena Dmitrievna.”

  Elena Dmitrievna Garina, a handsome elderly actress, who had arrived from Riga to star in the repertoire of a Russian-language theater in Berlin. Beginning at half-past eight. After a solitary supper Ilya Borisovich suddenly glanced at his watch, smiled a sly smile, and took a taxi to the theater.

  The “theater” was really a large hall meant for lectures, rather than plays. The performance had not yet started. An amateur poster featured Garina reclining on the skin of a panther shot by her lover, who was to shoot her later on. Russian speech crepitated in the cold vestibule. Ilya Borisovich relinquished into the hands of an old woman in black his cane, his bowler, and his topcoat, paid for a numbered jetton, which he slipped into his waistcoat pocket, and leisurely rubbing his hands looked around the vestibule. Close to him stood a group of three people: a young reporter whom Ilya Borisovich knew slightly, the young man’s wife (an angular lady with a lorgnette), and a stranger in a flashy suit, with a pale complexion, a little black beard, beautiful ovine eyes, and a gold chainlet around his hairy wrist.