I have read only two of the books of Vladimir Nabokov, Pale Fire and Lolita in addition to a few of his lectures on literature. I like to read well done literary biographies so when I received an E Mail promotion saying Vera (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov), winner of a Pulitzer Prize, by Stacey Schiff was for sale for a short time in Kindle format for $1.95 I purchased it. I am very glad I did. It is, among other things, a wonderful account of a marriage.
Mrs. Nabokov, I cannot bring myself to call this majestic woman, "Vera" worshipped her husband for his very real literary genius, loved him as a flawed man, was his greatest reader (he often said without her he would have written nothing) and his business and life manager. Mrs. Nabokov was the child of Russian Jews, Nabokov came from a once aristocratic family (both maintained a life time hatred of communism and a strong aversion to Soviet Russia ).
The book is not a straight.line chronological biography. It assumes you have a decent grounding in European literature and history and for sure assumes you know who Nabohov was, it being very unlikely that you would be interested in the book if you did not.
I do not desire to give a synopsis of their lives together. I will just talk about some of the many things I liked about and learned from this profound deeply emphatic biography. I learned of their very real struggles just to get by in Europe. Nabokov gave English and tennis lessons and his wife translated and did secretarial work while typing all her husband's manuscripts. It was fascinating to learn more about the Russian Emigre community in Paris and very sad to see many supported Hitler's anti-Semitic policies, seeing the Jews as responsible for the fall of the Tsar and the destruction of their privileged world. Mrs. Nabokov was often thought to be a White Russian countess or a German princess but she always quickly asserted she was a Russian Jew. Mrs Nabokov ran all the practical details of their life. I was ashamed of Nabokov when I learned he had numerous affairs with other women. They got out of Europe just in time, 1938. Nabokov taught literature at several American universities, Wesleyan, Cornell and Harvard. The accounts of the lectures and classroom atmosphere are just wonderful. Mrs. Nabokov, a very deeply read person, attended every class and set in the first row. Sciff tells us some say it was because she did not trust her husband around coeds and she had good reasons for this. It took Nabokov a while to get his feet with his lectures but in time they became among the most popular courses at Harvard. He there made many of his famous/infamous remarks trashing writers like Balzac, Stendhal, Faulkner, Mann, and many others.
Lolita changed everything for the Nabohov's. It was fascinating to see the extreme difficulty of getting it published as even publishers who loved it feared publication might get them arrested. I loved reading about all the money and offers that came flooding in to Mrs. Nabokov, who handled all her husband's correspondence and business affairs, once Lolita became a best seller. It was on the New York Times best seller list for nearly two years. The movie rights to Lolita (Vladimir approved of the movie and the lead actors) alone made them rich. The book sold millions of copies and the demand for his worked fired new editions of all his old works and translations into numerous languages. Mrs. Nabohov with her husband's occasional help, supervised translations into French and German. Lolita freed the Nabokov's from financial worry for the rest of their lives and left Vladimir free to focus on new works, now much in demand. The success of Lolita left many who never would read the book thinking perhaps the author was a closet pedophile. In one hilarious segment we learn he once planned to bring a 12 year old girl to a posh NYC publishing party as his escort. His wife vetoed the idea.
Vladimir loved it when Time put his picture on the cover.
We learn a lot about Nabokov fascination with butterflies. He was very serious on this and, of course, his wife supported his avocation.
Demitri Nabokov (1934 to 2012) was a successful opera singer and translator and was for many years in charge of his father's estate. He was also an amateur race car driver. He served in the US army, specializing in teaching military Russian.
Mrs Nabokov was not a doormat, she managed her husband, watching him at social events to prevent him from verbally trashing people. She was very capable of defending her rights and was far from afraid to tell off her husband.
Nabokov could not bear to be separated from her more than a few days. It seems like he needed her to tell him what to eat, what socks to wear etc. We also learn a lot about their one child, Demitri.
We learn about lots of fascinating people drawn to the Nabokov's once he became very famous. They lived in Switzerland, partially for tax purposes and traveled in Italy and France. It was great to hear of their time in Hollywood, living at The Beverly Hills Hotel. Nabokov met John Wayne at a studio party and asked him what he did for a living. Nabokov and his wife became American citizens and they were both staunch defenders of America during the Vietnam War era, driven on by their hatred of Communism and Soviet Russia.
The insights of Sciff on the work of Nabokov were very interesting. This is not a work of literary exegesis but you cannot separate the life of Mrs. Nabohov from the work of her husband. We also learn a lot about the publishing world and elite American universities, especially Harvard.
Above all this book is a portrait of a marriage. The Nabokovs deeply loved and understood each other. Mrs. Nabokov was the perfect "literary wife", supporting her husband in such a way that he could devote himself to his work. She was a very strong woman, dealing on her own with publishers, agents, buying cars etc. Nabokov was clearly very dependent on her for the very smallest details of his life. He gave meaning to her life.
This is a wonderful book. I loved it and will read, I hope, Nabokov better in the future as a result of reading it. There is just so much to like about this book. I hope to read Schiff's other biographies one day.
Vera Nabokov 1901 to 1991- married 1925 to 1977
Vladimir Nabokov 1899 to 1977
Stacy Schiff is the author of Véra (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov), winner of the Pulitzer Prize; Saint-Exupéry, a Pulitzer Prize finalist; and A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France, and the Birth of America, winner of the George Washington Book Prize, the Ambassador Award in American Studies, and the Gilbert Chinard Prize of the Institut Français d'Amérique. All three were New York Times Notable Books; the Los Angeles TimesBook Review, the Chicago Tribune, and The Economist also named A Great Improvisation a Best Book of the Year.
Schiff has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities and was a Director’s Fellow at the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library. She was awarded a 2006 Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In 2011 she was named a Library Lion by the New York Public Library. Schiff has written for The New Yorker, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, and the Boston Globe, among other publications. She lives in New York City.
From the author's webpage.
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