Review by Booklist Review
Publication of Nabokov's stories is an important enough event to send ripples of excitement through literary pools. This collection of 65 stories, containing 13 first-time English translations by Vladimir's son Dmitri, is certain to remind both fiction buffs and academics of the sensation Lolita caused and reinforce Nabokov's reputation as one of this century's most insightful, innovative, and darkly humorous writers. The stories appear chronologically and demonstrate Nabokov's primary obsessions: political satire and fable ("The Wood-Sprite," "Cloud, Castle, Lake" ), re-creations of life as a Russian emigre("Torpid Smoke" ), ever-increasing explorations of human relations ("A Matter of Chance," "The Admiralty Spire" ), and often common, yet dark or bizarre, aspects of human nature ("Revenge," "Scenes from the Life of a Double Monster" ). The reader will witness the development of Nabokov's style of narration through his creation of witty and intelligent narrators who directly address the reader, interject midstory, and employ impulsive and tactical storytelling techniques. Nabokov's interplay between levels of reality, experimentation with novel and story form, and quirky, yet often erudite and poetic prose style are qualities of early and later stories alike. "La Veneziana," which illustrates obsession and the blurring of boundaries, seems a natural predecessor to Lolita and Pale Fire. So much more can be said, but let's leave it at this: a priceless collection! (Reviewed Sept. 1, 1995)0394586158Janet St. John
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
The exiled Russian master began writing short stories while he was still at Cambridge University and, in his subsequent years of residence in Berlin and Paris during the 1920s and '30s, continued to publish them frequently, writing in Russian, French and, later, English. Most of the 65 stories gathered here appeared in a 1958 Doubleday collection, Nabokov's Dozen, or in three McGraw-Hill volumes in the 1970s, Details of a Sunset, Tyrants Destroyed and A Russian Beauty. The 13 stories appearing between hard covers here for the first timefinely translated, like many of the others, by Nabokov's son Dmitribreak no new ground, although one includes an original ending dropped from its first printing. They are mostly brief: fanciful, often enigmatic sketches of exiles or glimpses of life in old Russia accented by the familiar Nabokovian dexterity and wordplay. They show his brilliant eye for atmospheric color, his ability to catch fleeting shades of mood, but they are also mostly cool to the point of chill. One feels grateful that, in his later American sojourn, he abandoned the story form and began to write the novels and memoirs that made him deservedly famous. For it takes time to become acclimatized to Nabokov's world, to adjust to his peculiar angle of vision, to get comfortable with his rhythms; and to read him in the hasty doses served up by short stories emphasizes his capacity for brilliant inconsequentiality rather than the richness of heart and mind revealed in his longer works. (Oct.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
Presented here are 65 stories from the master, the author of one of the best and strangest novels in the history of fictionPale Fireas well as Lolita, Ada, Pnin, et al. Thirteen of these stories appear here for the first time in book form, although these early pieces are of less interest than the later ones, which contain all the linguistic and psychological twists for which Nabokov is famous. The earliest stories date from the 1920s and the latest from the 1950s, when Nabokov abandoned the form. Because of the editorial care taken by Nabokov's son Dmitri, this should appeal even to libraries fortunate enough still to own the earlier collections (Nabokov's Dozen, 1984; A Russian Beauty & Other Stories, 1973; Tyrants Destroyed & Other Stories, 1975; and Details of a Sunset & Other Stories, 1976). One could hope that a new movie version of Lolita currently in production will rekindle interest in Nabokov. An essential purchase.Robert E. Brown, Onondaga Cty. P.L., Syracuse, N.Y. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
The collected short fiction of the great Russian-born writer (18991977) who became a master of fiction in three languages and whose imposingly irascible presence on the 20th-century literary scene has perhaps obscured full recognition of his genius as symbolist, savant, and storyteller. There's little here that can be called apprentice work, even among the earliest of this rich volume's 65 stories, a gathering that ranges from the early 1920s through mid-1950s and assembles the contents of four previously published volumes plus 13 uncollected stories. Literary influences are only intermittently blatant (e.g., in the Chekhovian ``Christmas'' and Gogolian ``Razor,'' and in ``Bachmann,'' a disturbingly enigmatic account of a thwarted romance that reads like an early Thomas Mann story). Fantasy and supernaturalism are strongly present in such accomplished and eerie pieces as ``Lik,'' ``Tyrants Destroyed,'' and ``The Vane Sisters,'' the latter being perhaps the most archly self-indulgent ghost story ever written. What may surprise many readers is the relative scarcity of tales in which Nabokov's notoriously Olympian sensibility is clearly revealed. Only in the icy ``A Dashing Fellow'' (whose lustful protagonist withholds from his conquest the news of her father's death) and the equally mordant ``Details of a Sunset'' do we feel a judgmental or condescending authorial presence. The many stories dealing with Russian émigrés in Europe seeking aesthetic and romantic fulfillment, include several of Nabokov's most affecting: ``The Fight,'' ``A Guide to Berlin,'' and ``A Russian Beauty'' are prominent examples. Best of all, there's ``The Potato Elf,'' a weird, troubling story of a fatal love triangle featuring preternaturally vivid characters and replete with ingenious sexual symbolism. The products of an incomparably rich imagination, these 65 wonders comprise a virtual education in how fictionwell, ought to be written. An indispensable book.
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