Signs And Symbols (Stories Of Vladimir Nabokov) (2000) - Plot & Excerpts
There stories are so thrilling that after reading a few pages, I have to get up and pace the room. Never mind dorsal hairs, heart pounding prose. Prose that burns you up. Find myself returning year after year, like a moth.“My advice to a budding literary critic would be as follows. Learn to distinguish banality. Remember that mediocrity thrives on "ideas." Beware of the modish message. Ask yourself if the symbol you have detected is not your ownfootprint. Ignore allegories. By all means place the "how" above the "what" but do not let it be confused with the "so what." Rely on the sudden erection of your small dorsal hairs. Do not drag in Freud at this point. All the rest depends on personal talent.” I'm always amazed with Vladimir Nabokov's ability to included miniature versions of his own life in all of his writing, in small details here and there that might only stand out if you know his personal life. Reading "Signs and Symbols" was bittersweet because Nabokov includes several details of his own life, particularly about his emigration to and from Europe and — the saddest of all — the relative who died at the hands of the Germans.As usual, Nabokov always writes with a theme of unreliable narrators, or at least delves into the question of reality versus illusion and, sometimes, as in this case, mental illness. But the story is less about any of those things as it is about the family trying to cope with everything in their lives as their suicidal son celebrates a birthday alone in a sanatorium. Nabokov can write about anything and have it be beautiful, thoughtful and sad all at once.
What do You think about Signs And Symbols (Stories Of Vladimir Nabokov) (2000)?
What he had really wanted to do was to tear a hole in his world and escape.
—Austin
How I admire New Yorker and its works! This was an amazing story.
—yasmin610
Nabokov's eloquence is a thing of beauty.
—milishax3
