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Speak, Memory (An Autobiography Revisited)

by Vladimir Nabokov

4.19 of 5 stars 4.19 · rating details · 7,659 ratings · 508 reviews

Nabokov's autobioraphical memoir of a loving, civilized family, of adolescent awakenings, flight from Bolshevik terror, education in England, and émigré life in Paris and Berlin. The Nabokovs were eccentric, liberal aristocrats, who lived a life immersed in politics and literature on splendid country estates until their world was swept away by the Russian revolution when t ...more

Paperback , 336 pages

Published 1996 by Vintage (first published 1951)

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Community Reviews

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Mar 31, 2012 Buck rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: life-writing , russians

Vladimir Nabokov was the Niles Crane of 20th-century literature: snooty, fastidious, and comically inept at being a normal guy. (And it’s part of his fastidiousness that he would have despised my handy, pop-culture analogy). Even his ailments had something snobbish about them. I mean, synesthesia? Who has that? And what kind of douche decides that sleep is too plebeian? Would it have been so hard to come down with herpes and depression like everyone else?

Needless to say, Speak, Memory is one of Vladimir Nabokov was the Niles Crane of 20th-century literature: snooty, fastidious, and comically inept at being a normal guy. (And it’s part of his fastidiousness that he would have despised my handy, pop-culture analogy). Even his ailments had something snobbish about them. I mean, synesthesia? Who has that? And what kind of douche decides that sleep is too plebeian? Would it have been so hard to come down with herpes and depression like everyone else?

Needless to say, Speak, Memory is one of the most brilliant autobiographies ever written, and I’m just delaying the moment when I throw my panties on the stage along with every other reviewer here. But first I need to make fun of Nabokov a bit more. Six pages into his foreword, he tosses off this gag-inducing little metaphor:

I hope to write some day a “Speak on, Memory,” covering the years 1940-1960 spent in America: the evaporation of certain volatiles and the melting of certain metals are still going on in my coils and crucibles.

That’s a fairly standard trope, I guess: the artist as alchemist. What irritates me about it is the self-complacency it implies: this is the uptown equivalent of hanging a “Genius at Work” sign on your cubicle wall. It’s tacky, not to mention unbearably precious. Also, wasn’t alchemy discredited centuries ago as a bogus pseudo-science?

In one sense, though, the metaphor is well-chosen, because Nabokov really did view art as some kind of occult jiggery-pokery:

I discovered in nature the non-utilitarian delights that I sought in art. Both were a form of magic, both were a game of intricate enchantment and deception.

I dunno. It’s not that I expect every artist to justify the ways of God to man, or forge the conscience of his race in the smithy of his soul (blech), or help me free my mind so that my ass may follow, but that strikes me as a depressingly sterile notion of art. Games, magic, deception: it all sounds like an elaborate Easter egg hunt. Or a Dungeons & Dragons marathon. Either way, it’s something I grew out of a long time ago. And if you point out that Nabokov wrote Lolita , whereas I’ve written a bunch of book reports for a stupid website, I won’t have much of a comeback for you. Except shut up.

I clearly have huge problems with some of the assumptions behind Speak, Memory , but the book itself is just so damn beautiful that I can’t stay mad at it for long. People talk about Nabokov’s style as if it were some glittering, rococo gush, but his elaborations are never merely ornamental: they’re in the service of an almost preposterous precision. He wants to get it exactly right, and if that means ransacking the OED and piling up his clauses into syntactical Jenga towers – well, you’ll just have to sit there and take it. Or go play Wii. The fact is, the world is so immeasurably complex, and our perceptions are so deliriously rich that even the most exhaustive representation of one tiny patch of reality can only be a gross simplification – a thing of sticks and squiggles, daubed by a gifted chimpanzee. Nabokov’s prose is a bit less of a simplification than anyone else’s, that’s all. Meaning, he comes as close to honouring the riotous profusion of experience as any human being is likely to get.

There. I told you the panties would come off.
...more

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Dec 03, 2012 Mariel rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommends it for: I want to be buried with a pocketful of clarity

Recommended to Mariel by: the attorney didn't put enough girls on my jury

I have often noticed that after I had bestowed on the characters of my novels some treasured item of my past, it would pine away in the artificial world where I had so abruptly placed it. Although it lingered on in my mind, its personal warmth, its retrospective appeal had gone and, presently, it became more closely identified with my novel than with my former self, where it had seemed to be so safe from the intrusion of the artist.

Please disregard the three stars above. There is no dark lined s ...more

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Feb 28, 2015 Riku Sayuj rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: biographies , lit , review-poems

Remember Those Evenings

Reading tonight, he remembers those evenings,
Walking together in the endless estates,
Where the sun poured over shining green leaves.
No hint of shades.

Again in this room, with the screen-light hiding the night,
Look back to those mountains where our walking sticks are hid;
See him turn to the window, thinking his last
Of faraway climes.

Now nights come bringing only doubts, and the dead howl
Of half-formed thoughts, in their windy dwelling
Inside his mind, too full of easy ...more

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Dec 05, 2014 مروان البلوشي rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: السيرة-الذاتية

من أجمل وأعظم الكتب التي قرأتها في حياتي، وأشعر بأني سأعود لقراءته مرة بعد الأخرى في المستقبل.
ولا يحتوي الكتاب فحسب على رؤية ناباكوف حول الذاكرة، والشوق، والحنين، والمنفى، والوطن، واعادة صناعة الماضي والهوية. بل أنه يحتوي على بعض آراء ناباكوف الغريبة والفريدة حول مواضيع مثل فكرة الزمن والوقت والخلود، يقول ناباكوف :

“I confess I do not believe in time. I like to fold my magic carpet, after use, in such a way as to superimpose one part of the pattern upon another. Let visitors trip. And the highes ...more

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Dec 27, 2012 Sue rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommends it for: readers of memoirs, biographies

Recommended to Sue by: The Imprinted Life

Shelves: bio-memoir , russia , library-book , immigrant-exile-refugee , around-the-world-in-52 , read-in-2012

Finis! There are parts of this memoir that I absolutely loved and there are parts, mostly later in the memoir and in Nabokov's life, that I found more difficult to embrace as a reader. The Everyman's Library Edition I read also has an excellent introduction by Brian Boyd which offers great insights into the book, especially for a reader like me who has no background in Nabokov.

To outline the task he had set before him, Nabokov writes in his Foreward

"This re-Englishing of a Russian re-version of ...more

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Jul 19, 2007 Allycks rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites

This is, in my opinion, Nabokov's best work. The autobiography as a form suits Nabokov perfectly, as his novels are never so much about plot or 'big ideas,' just the intense poetic possibilities of language itself. So be forewarned, there is almost no useful information here. You may learn a thing or two about pre-Revolution Russia, a scrap of detail about his encounters with Joyce in Paris, or some tidbits about butterfly hunting, but really there's nothing to be learned, no story, no clues to ...more

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Mar 17, 2008 Sanjeev rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: done , recommend-nonfiction

Disgusting that a somebody could be such an amazing writer. (And this is a person born in Russia, writing in English!) The word "genius" seems to come up a lot when people speak of Nabokov. Having read this, I now understand.

It took me some time to become used to the way he writes. Nabokov often does not seem to care if his point is immediately clear to the reader. Some of the gems I found in this book I could just as easily have missed in a quicker read. So close attention is rewarded. Also rec Disgusting that a somebody could be such an amazing writer. (And this is a person born in Russia, writing in English!) The word "genius" seems to come up a lot when people speak of Nabokov. Having read this, I now understand.

It took me some time to become used to the way he writes. Nabokov often does not seem to care if his point is immediately clear to the reader. Some of the gems I found in this book I could just as easily have missed in a quicker read. So close attention is rewarded. Also recommended is a dictionary since his vocabulary is...good. Knowledge of French does not hurt either (possibly an offshoot of his indifference to making his point accessible are the many untranslated French sentences).

I found the discussion of his aristocratic pedigree a bit taxing at times, but he treats it all somewhat lightly so it is manageable.

In all, I really could not ask for more from a book. His insights, observations, ideas voiced, etc...they are worthwhile, priceless.

Describing the writing does not do it any justice, so here are some examples of what I liked:

Of the nothings he hears before falling asleep as a child
"It is a neutral, detached, anonymous voice, which I catch saying words of no importance to me whatever - an English or a Russian sentence, not even addressed to me, and so trivial that I hardly dare give samples, lest the flatness I wish to convey be marred by a molehill of sense ."
(emphasis added, by me)

About his love for a person:
"I have to have all space and all time participate in my emotion, in my mortal love, so that the edge of its mortality is taken off, thus helping me fight the utter degradation, ridicule, and horror of having developed an infinity of sensation and thought within a finite existence."

Other random selections:
"...when one is wide awake, at moments of robust joy and achievement, on the highest terrace of consciousness, that mortality has a chance to peer beyond its own limits...And although nothing much can be seen through the mist, there is somehow the blissful feeling that one is looking in the right direction."

"The lilac shrubs in full bloom...displayed clusters of a fluffy gray in the dusk - the ghost of purple." ...more

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Jul 28, 2014 Mikimbizii rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: favourites

Sometimes a book just happens to you, it finds you, popping up from an exhibition that you almost didn't go to, from a dusty corner of a college library or a tiny book shop. The flirting is momentary, you know this is the real thing; there is no hesitation. You take it home, its love at first sight ("and ever and ever sight"). Suddenly all your life so far seem so mundane and banal, a new world of tender mellowness opens - you assimilate it, drown and resurrect in it, live its sublimity, you bec ...more

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Apr 21, 2013 Marco Tamborrino rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

"Da allora in poi, per parecchi anni, finché scrivendo un romanzo non riuscii a liberarmi di quella feconda emozione, ho continuato a equiparare la perdita del mio paese alla perdita del mio amore."

Non ho trattato bene questo libro. Sono stato cattivo nei suoi confronti. L'ho iniziato verso la fine dello scorso anno scolastico, poi l'ho ripreso verso la fine di questo e infine oggi l'ho concluso. È un libro meraviglioso, non c'è dubbio. Tuttavia la sua pesantezza lo rende una lettura di nicchi ...more

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Aug 21, 2015 Jimmy rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: male , russia , and-a-half-stars , year-1960s , memoir-ish

Many years ago, I had read about half of Lolita before putting it down. I don’t remember why, since I enjoyed the extremely pleasing sentences at the time. Nevertheless, I have not read any Nabokov since then, and everyone seems to be personally insulted by this omission. What is it that inspires Nabokov fans to froth at the mouth so violently when it comes to this topic? ( update : I have now re-read Lolita, and my review can be found here )

I was promised that this book will let me into the secret Many years ago, I had read about half of Lolita before putting it down. I don’t remember why, since I enjoyed the extremely pleasing sentences at the time. Nevertheless, I have not read any Nabokov since then, and everyone seems to be personally insulted by this omission. What is it that inspires Nabokov fans to froth at the mouth so violently when it comes to this topic? ( update : I have now re-read Lolita, and my review can be found here )

I was promised that this book will let me into the secret. So I feel like even though 3.5 stars is not a bad score, anything less than 5 stars is an insult to the incredible reputation this has built up in my mind (as well as the formidable expectations of said recommenders).

In a way, I can totally see why people love him so much. It is hard not to be floored by the considerable talents of this prose. The sentences, at their best, are indeed delicious. Nabokov seems to me all about the sensual enjoyment of language, within a certain framework of description:

Closed inside shutters, a lighted candle, Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, something-something little child, the child kneeling on the pillow that presently would engulf his humming head. -- p. 86

But he isn’t always as good when it comes to bigger ideas or psychology. In fact, he has little interest in either, and when he attempts them, it often has the scent of obvious melodramatic effort to it, like bad poetry:

All is still, spellbound, enthralled by the moon, fancy’s rearvision mirror. The snow is real, though, and as I bend to it and scoop up a handful, sixty years crumble to glittering frost-dust between my fingers. --p.100

Like a butterfly’s unintuitively wild flight, his sentences go all over the place, and beautifully so. But his is almost the opposite of another sentence-master: Beckett. Whereas Beckett’s sentences can float like a butterfly, they also know how to sting like a bee. It can be beautiful or ugly, long or short, totally taking you off guard with its uncompromising and singular vision. Nabokov is never cruel enough in his economy, his flourishes take too long, and by the time he lands that final punch, it feels overdone, like a rubbery egg. Yes, beautiful, but heavy with labor, dripping with intention.

Perhaps it is unfair to compare him to Beckett, who afterall, has no aesthetic similarities to Nabokov. Maybe Flaubert, then, whose sentences are also beautiful in a certain traditional way, but whose economy and clarity constantly stuns and surprises with layer upon layer of psychological subtlety and humor. Clearly painstaking effort was put in the writing, and yet this effort is also hidden from the reader, so that it looks easy... natural, even. Or maybe we should bring in someone who is equally enamoured by the beauty and playful potential of language, someone like Wallace Stevens, whose words have a certain surface sheen, yet hold so many more implications beneath their enticing veneers, so much philosophical depth.

Nabokov’s strength is in impressionistic description, and in evocation. When he tries to do more, it is very hit and miss. He is like one of those guitar virtuosos getting carried away by their own flashy fingerwork, capable and impressive, but rarely are their technical skills used with the kind of artistic restraint that creates truly great songs. Of course, I am only basing this on this one book alone, so upon further reading, revisions may be in order.

That said, there were many memorable moments in this book. I didn’t truly get into it until Chapter 4, but boy was that chapter good. Chapter 5 was also great, about Mademoiselle. Chapter 14, about emigrant life, and chess puzzles, and where the stylization seemed less pronounced, was also interesting. Most of the book concerns itself with the many tutors, servants and other people who worked for and revolved around his aristocratic family; his interest in butterflies, writing poems, and wooing girls comes up later. Then social upheaval and fleeing the country. I found his voice a bit snobby and egotistical at times, which was also a turn-off. But most of the book was enjoyable enough, though nowhere near the heights they reached in my hype-induced imagination. ...more

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Jan 04, 2015 Susan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is a beautifully evocative memoir, consisting of the personal recollections of Nabakov, recalling his childhood in Imperial Russia . Nabakov was born in 1899 to a family who were not only members of the aristocracy, but heavily involved in politics. His father was a liberal, who opposed the Tsar and, in fact, as his grandmother wryly pointed out, was working to bring down the way of life which would eventually see him exiled and virtually penniless…

However, this is certainly not a memoir fi This is a beautifully evocative memoir, consisting of the personal recollections of Nabakov, recalling his childhood in Imperial Russia . Nabakov was born in 1899 to a family who were not only members of the aristocracy, but heavily involved in politics. His father was a liberal, who opposed the Tsar and, in fact, as his grandmother wryly pointed out, was working to bring down the way of life which would eventually see him exiled and virtually penniless…

However, this is certainly not a memoir filled with sorrow or bitterness. Instead, the author recreates his privileged childhood, with its recurring pattern of winter in St Petersburg, the spring and summer spent at the family’s country estate and the autumn in foreign resorts. We read of the many tutors and governesses who came and went, the author and his brother’s many escapades (including boarding a ferry and leaving their nanny wringing her hands on the quay as her charges floated away and an attempted elopement with a French playmate). There is the horror of hearing his father might have died in a duel, the joy of butterfly collecting - always a passion throughout his life – his early attempts at writing poetry and his final leaving of Russia after the revolution.

Mostly, though, what we get are little snippets – beautifully written – of a world that has long gone, but which can see through the eyes of our narrator. Places, people, a way of life long since vanished, are recreated. You can almost feel the cold on carriage drives through the snow, or imagine walks in the countryside, so vivid are the descriptions. As such, it is almost not what is written, but how it is written, that is important here. The eye for detail; of the memory of a room, books on a shelf, or how it felt to wake in the morning, is what makes the book come alive. I think it is an important memoir and one which paints a portrait of a certain era and way of life which the author obviously missed, but recalled with love.

...more

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Aug 02, 2014 James rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: autobiography

This is one of the most fascinating and well-written books I've ever read. Nabokov lived through some of the biggest events of the 20th Century. So you would expect his memoir to discuss in detail those events and their significance to him. But such a predictable telling just isn't Nabokov's style. What you get instead are extremely elaborate depictions of his childhood/adolescent past-times, all the various tutors he had, his formative crushes, his beloved and foibled family, and the morose Swi ...more

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Oct 08, 2014 Cristina rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: pallosissimi

Vladimir perdonami. So che sei enormemente apprezzato e stimato, la colpa e' mia, lo so, ma non ce la fo'. Ho provato ad interessarmi alla tua felicissima e fortunatissima infanzia, ma e' tutto troppo, e' tutto "issimo" intorno a te. Mi hai enormente ammorbata e indisposta con l'inutile albero genealogico della tua famiglia bellissima ricchissima intelligentissima educatissima importantissima etc... ma non ci ho trovato anima capisci? La nota della spesa ha piu' colore piu' calore Vladimir. Ho p ...more

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Aug 14, 2013 Chrissie rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: audible , bio , russia , alt , soviet-union , favorites

This book is amazing, not for the story it tells but for how that story is written. It consists of essays written and published at different times and places, but it all holds together. Each chapter follows the other in basically chronological order. Let the author speak for himself:

For the present final edition of Speak Memory I have not only introduced basic changes and copious additions into the initial English text, but have availed myself of the corrections I made while turning it into Russ This book is amazing, not for the story it tells but for how that story is written. It consists of essays written and published at different times and places, but it all holds together. Each chapter follows the other in basically chronological order. Let the author speak for himself:

For the present final edition of Speak Memory I have not only introduced basic changes and copious additions into the initial English text, but have availed myself of the corrections I made while turning it into Russian. This re-Englishing of a Russian reversion of what had been an English re-telling of Russian memories in the first place proved to be a diabolical task, but some consolation was given me by the thought that such multiple metamorphoses, familiar to butterflies, had not been tried by any human before.

The book covers the years from his birth in 1899 to 1940, when he, his wife and son immigrated to the US. It begins with his Russian boyhood, followed by his émigré years in Europe. It covers his tutors, his passion for butterflies, a bit about his synesthesia, his coming-of –age, his first girlfriends, his writing and poetry. You clearly understand where he came from, but that is NOT the glory of the book. What is astonishingly good is how he describes memories. What a vocabulary! Words, words and more words. Adjectives and unusual verbal constructions. It is magical. If you want simple wording, I guess this is not for you though.

Since what is so stupendous about the book is the writing, I must offer you another sample. It is at the end of the book when he is soon off to America on an ocean liner. He is walking with his wife and six year-old son up a path in a park in Paris, and they spot the boat:

What I really remember about this neutrally blooming design (the park) is its clever thematic connection with transatlantic gardens and parks. For suddenly as we came to the end of its path you and I (his wife) saw something that we did not immediately point out to our child, so as to enjoy in full the blissful shock the enchantment and glee he would experience on discovering ahead the ungenuinely gigantic, the unrealistically real prototype of the various toy vessels he dottled about in his bath. There in front of us, where a broken row of house stood between us and the harbor and where the eye encountered all sorts of stratagems, such as pale blue and pink underwear cake-walking on a clothesline or a ladies bicycle and a striped cat oddly sharing a rudimentary balcony of cast iron, it was most satisfying to make out among the jumbled angles of roofs and walls a splendid ship’s funnel showing from behind the clothesline as something in a scrambled picture. Find what the sailor has hidden that the finder cannot un-see once it has been seen.

I am writing what I have listened to in the audiobook version of this book, which is well narrated by Stefan Rudnicki, in a deep tone perfect for Nabokov’s words. The narration has just the right pomp!

I LOVED the book, but it might not be for everyone.

...more

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Feb 10, 2008 Clarissa Olivarez rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I just prefer his fiction. I understand that this is one of the most important autobiographies/memoirs ever written, but I fail to see why. I admit that Nabokov's "poetic prose" really shines through, at certain times; however, on the whole, I found the narrative voice to be frustrating, pompous, and oppressive.

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Apr 17, 2010 K.D. Absolutely rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommended to K.D. by: 501 Must Read Books

Shelves: 501 , memoirs

Wow! This is one of the best memoirs I've ever read! Prior to this, top in my list were Frank McCourt's Angela's Ashes and Harry Bernstein's The Invisible Wall: A Love Story That Broke Barriers .

Vladimir Nabokov's Speak, Memory neither has that sorry circumstance of being a born in dirt-poor Irish family nor being a witness to a tragic love story between two people of different religions. Rather, the young Nabokov was the eldest child of a rich political couple residing on a big house (with lots ...more

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Mar 02, 2013 Juan rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: nabokov

The embedding of minute details from a world forever gone into the plush, exuberant prose of Nabokov is the closest you will come to literature practiced as jewellery, horology or some combination of the two.

Apart from the stuff I mentioned in the reading updates I'd like to bring to the fore, from amongst the embarrassment of riches that is Speak, Memory , the following:

In speaking about his love for composing "fairy chess" moves, which he describes as a poethico-mathematical endeavor, Nabokov ...more

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Jul 11, 2008 AK rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Recommends it for: those who appreciate prose style and things Russian

Shelves: im-in-love , college , world-and-mind-changers

A gift of a book, a beautiful memoir.

Whenever I start thinking of my love for a person, I am in the habit of immediately drawing radii from my love - from my heart, from the tender nucleus of a personal matter - to monstrously remote points of the universe. Something impels me to measure the consciousness of my love against such unimaginable and incalculable things as the behavior of nebulae (whose very remoteness seems a form of insanity), the dreadful pitfalls of eternity, the unknowledgeable A gift of a book, a beautiful memoir.

Whenever I start thinking of my love for a person, I am in the habit of immediately drawing radii from my love - from my heart, from the tender nucleus of a personal matter - to monstrously remote points of the universe. Something impels me to measure the consciousness of my love against such unimaginable and incalculable things as the behavior of nebulae (whose very remoteness seems a form of insanity), the dreadful pitfalls of eternity, the unknowledgeable beyond the unknown, the helplessness, the cold, the sickening involutions and interpenetrations of space and time. It is a pernicious habit, but I can do nothing about it. It can be compared to the uncontrollable flick of an insomniac's tongue checking a jagged tooth in the night of his mouth and bruising itself in doing so but still persevering. I have known people who, upon accidentally touching something - a doorpost, a wall - had to go through a certain very rapid and systematic sequence of manual contacts with various surfaces in the room before returning to a balanced existence. It cannot be helped; I must know where I stand, where you and my son stand. When that slow-motion, silent explosion of love takes place in me, unfolding its melting fringes and overwhelming me with the sense of something much vaster, much more enduring and powerful than the accumulation of matter or energy in any imaginable cosmos, then my mind cannot but pinch itself to see if it is really awake. I have to make a rapid inventory of the universe, just as a man in a dream tries to condone the absurdity of his position by making sure he is dreaming. I have to have all space and all time participate in my emotion, in my mortal love, so that the edge of its mortality is taken off, thus helping me to fight the utter degradation, ridicule, and horror of having developed an infinity of sensation and thought within a finite existence. ...more

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Nov 21, 2008 Manny rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

One of the greatest literary autobiographies ever - a model for how to do it. My favourite anecdote: when he talks about how cold it was in his student room, he denies the rumour that the water in his toothmug froze solid during the night. Just a crisp layer of ice on the top, that he broke with his toothbrush...

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Aug 13, 2008 Geoff rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: favorites , volodya

I could not have asked for a better reading experience.

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May 02, 2015 Inderjit Sanghera rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

‘Speak Memory’ is the second edition of Nabokov’s autobiography, which he initially titled ‘Conclusive Evidence’: a mundane, banal and academic title for a book of such effervescent poetry. Nabokov’s original suggestion of Speak Mnemosyne does the poetry of Nabokov’s prose more justice, however it was deemed unpronounceable and thus unsellable by Nabokov’s publishers. This little snippet of information in many ways sums up Nabokov’s art; Nabokov’s works deal with the quiddity and innate richness ‘Speak Memory’ is the second edition of Nabokov’s autobiography, which he initially titled ‘Conclusive Evidence’: a mundane, banal and academic title for a book of such effervescent poetry. Nabokov’s original suggestion of Speak Mnemosyne does the poetry of Nabokov’s prose more justice, however it was deemed unpronounceable and thus unsellable by Nabokov’s publishers. This little snippet of information in many ways sums up Nabokov’s art; Nabokov’s works deal with the quiddity and innate richness of human existence, the miracle of consciousness and the delirious and deleterious pangs of love, yet for most people, whose palates have been desensitized by the baleful bromides of conventional literature, art and media, Nabokov’s unconventionality renders his poetry unpalatable. The iridesces of a rainbow on a shore-line, the spread of a butterfly’s wings on a morning sparkling with splendorous sunshine, these are the jewels which Nabokov has ensconced within his work, which the careful reader will need dig out; a turn of phrase here, a solecism there, until the reader’s vision is “Nabokovized”, the sun is no longer just yellow, but orange, amber and all sorts of other harlequin colours and in which the simple fall of rain is describe as;

“The rain, which had been a mass of violently descending water wherein the trees writhed and rolled, was reduced all at once to oblique lines of silent gold breaking into short and long dashes against a background of subsiding vegetable agitation. Gulfs of voluptuous blue were expanding between great clouds-heap upon heap of pure white and purplish gray…”

Nabokov recalls being taught painting by a famous landscape painter, who in later years remarked in Nabokov’s singular lack of talent-in many ways Nabokov’s painterly prose makes up this, as he is, with words, able to give full justice to his vibrant vision of the world in a way that he never could with paint and brush. Nabokov grew up within an intellectually and artistically Russian aristocrat family and the vast and luscious grounds of his family estate developed his keen love of nature, of the brooks, meadows, trees and forests which made up his estate. Not that there was anything especially beautiful about his family estate, it is moreso the case the Nabokov was able to beautify even the most quotidian things, as he world around him shimmers with the splendours of his unimaginable vision;

“I remember one particular sunset. It lent an ember to my bicycle bell. Overhead, above the black music of the telegraph wires, a number of long, dark-violet clouds lined with flamingo pink hug motionless in a fan-shaped arrangement: the whole thing was like some prodigious ovation in terms of colour and form!”
“And let me not leave out the moon-for surely there must be a moon, the full, incredibly clear disc that goes so well with lusty Russian frosts. So there it comes, steering out a flock of small dappled clouds, which it tinges with a vague iridescence; and, as it sails higher, it grazes the runner tracks left on the road, where every sparkling lump of snow is emphasized by a swollen shadow.”

Linked to Nabokov’s love of nature is his interest in lepidoptera and his love for butterflies and their influence on his art. Aside from the very personal pleasures Nabokov gained from hunting butterflies, their sense of mimicry, the multifarity of colours they exuded and their metamorphosis from a commonplace caterpillar to a bewitching butterfly are essential to understanding his works, as Nabokov states; “I discovered in nature the nonutilitarian delights I sought in art. Both were a form of magic, both were a game of intricate enchantment and deception.” Just like a butterfly emerging effulgently out of its chrysalis, so too human perception can emerge outside of the dark cocoon which envelops our minds, if were to only take a moment and observe the endless wonders of life and the world around us; nature and literature are two of the ways in which we can appreciate the beauty of the world, however one can just as easily find meaning in life via love for the people around us.

Nabokov had a deliriously happy childhood under his liberal parents, his father a stoic yet sensitive statesman, with a passion for politics, nature and art (Nabokov inherited the latter two), and Nabokov is able to brilliantly bring about the innate moral strength of his father. Yet his descriptions of his father are tinged with a hint of tragedy at his untimely (and accidental) assassination at the hands of a Soviet gunman-Nabokov had a similarly close relationship to his mother and reading ‘Speak, Memory’ the reader begins to understand his dislike of Freud, with his distasteful theories of sexuality in childhood (for Nabokov the most magical period in a person’s life) and its desire to homogenize the experience of each individual human being so that it fitted in with the fantastical fantasies of a neurotic. Despite the sadness which tinges Nabokov’s recollections to his father, he won’t let fate or the assassins’ bullet interfere with his father’s brilliance. One of the most wonderful passages in the book is the description of his father as is being thrown in the air as part of a peasant ritual;
“From my place at table I would suddenly see through one of the west windows a marvelous case of levitation. There, for an instant, the figure of my father in his windrippled white summer suit would be displayed, gloriously sprawling in midair, his limbs in a curiously casual attitude, his handsome, imperturbable features turned to the sky. Thrice, to the mighty heave-ho of his invisible tossers, he would fly up in this fashion, and the second time he would go higher than the first and then there he would be, on his last and loftiest flight, reclining, as if for good, against the cobalt blue of the summer noon, like one of those paradisiac personages who comfortably soar, with such a wealth of folds in their garments, on the vaulted ceiling of a church while below, one by one, the wax tapers in mortal hands light up to make a swarm of minute flames in the mist of incense, and the priest chants of eternal repose, and funeral lilies conceal the face of whoever lies there, among the swimming lights, in the open coffin”

Nabokov’s quest is to bring to life the people or places we loved via our memory of them. Nabokov distrusted concepts of linear time-for Nabokov time worked far more flexibly than that and the key to unlocking the straitjacket of linear time was via memory.

“A sense of security, of well-being, of summer warmth pervades my memory. That robust reality makes a ghost of the present. The mirror brims with brightness; a bumblebee has entered the room and bumps against the ceiling. Everything is as it should be, nothing will ever change, nobody will ever die.”

Memory is intrinsic to us understanding the world around us, to remembering the places or people who pierced our hearts with love, to overcoming the innumerable tragedies of life and to igniting the conflagration of consciousness and giving meaning to the universe;

“How small the cosmos (a kangaroo’s patch would hold it!) how paltry and puny in comparison to human consciousness, to a single individual recollection, and its expression in words!”
...more

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Apr 29, 2014 Heidi rated it 5 of 5 stars

Like the ardent lepidopterist he is, Nabokov pins beautiful memories to the page: moments in time so saturated with colour and intricacy it’s as if the reader was there as witness. I loved this book and its old-fashioned language, dripping with adjectives and metaphors, wringing so much nuance from small everyday scenes that they appear more real than if they were seen in a painting or a film. He is a master of the reconstituted moment.

Speak, Memory paints a picture of the author’s privileged l Like the ardent lepidopterist he is, Nabokov pins beautiful memories to the page: moments in time so saturated with colour and intricacy it’s as if the reader was there as witness. I loved this book and its old-fashioned language, dripping with adjectives and metaphors, wringing so much nuance from small everyday scenes that they appear more real than if they were seen in a painting or a film. He is a master of the reconstituted moment.

Speak, Memory paints a picture of the author’s privileged life in Russia from 1903 to 1940, before he emigrated to the United States. In 1953, he had the counter-intuitive experience of translating his memoir—which he’d planned to call Speak, Mnemosyne, until it was pointed out to him that “little old ladies would not want to ask for a book whose title they could not pronounce”—from English to his native Russian.

He has a labyrinthine vocabulary. I started underlining words I didn’t know: there is at least one, often two or more, per page. And the voluptuous images! He signals what is to come with his first paragraph:

The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness. Although the two are identical twins, man, as a rule, views the prenatal abyss with more calm than the one he is heading for (at some forty-five hundred heartbeats an hour).

I was so excited when on page 34 he describes the “hypnagogic mirages” I stumbled upon some years ago as a technique to put myself to sleep—first time I’ve ever seen them described. And haven’t we all followed the hypnotic dance of telephone lines while staring dreamily out the window of a car or train?

“…the wires, the thin black wires—were doing their best to slant up, to ascend skywards, despite the lightning blows dealt them by one telegraph pole after another; but just as all six, in a triumphant swoop of pathetic elation, were about to reach the top of the window, a particularly vicious blow would bring them down, as low as they had ever been, and they would have to start all over again.”

Listen to this gorgeous description of his beloved mother:

As she was being tucked up again in the sleigh, I watched the vapor exhaled by all, horse included. I watched, too, the familiar pouting movement she made to distend the network of her close-fitting veil drawn too tight over her face, and as I write this, the touch of reticulated tenderness that my lips used to feel when I kissed her veiled cheek comes back to me— flies back to me with a shout of joy out of the snow-blue, blue-windowed (the curtains are not yet drawn) past.

Nabokov shouts with joy throughout the memoir. His writing is not small and contained and grey and muscular, in the style of so much current writing, and I love him for it. I feel as though I could almost stop reading memoirs now.

Note: I selected the wrong version of Speak, Memory . I actually read Speak, Memory: An Autobiography Revisited, containing Nabkov’s foreward dated January 5, 1966.
...more

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Sep 16, 2009 anca dc rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2008-2009

Scriere placuta si lina, care prin frumusetea descrierilor m’a plimbat prin locuri n_e_m_a_i_v_a_z_u_t_e dar, uite asa, i_m_a_g_i_n_a_t_e :) Am colindat paduri, am fugit pe plaja impreuna cu Colette si Floss, am simtit mainile aspre ale lui Mademoiselle, am simtit din plin zborul fluturilor, iar adierea vioaie a aripilor acestora razbate de’a lungul intregii autobiografii, nu numai in capitolul alocat acestei pasiuni. Cu Nabokov am ris, am ris pe strada cu oameni mirati linga mine, am ris de per Scriere placuta si lina, care prin frumusetea descrierilor m’a plimbat prin locuri n_e_m_a_i_v_a_z_u_t_e dar, uite asa, i_m_a_g_i_n_a_t_e :) Am colindat paduri, am fugit pe plaja impreuna cu Colette si Floss, am simtit mainile aspre ale lui Mademoiselle, am simtit din plin zborul fluturilor, iar adierea vioaie a aripilor acestora razbate de’a lungul intregii autobiografii, nu numai in capitolul alocat acestei pasiuni. Cu Nabokov am ris, am ris pe strada cu oameni mirati linga mine, am ris de perceptiile lui asupra predicilor din biserica si perceptiile americanilor asupra lui vazindu’l la vinatoare de fluturi :)) M’a plimbat prin toata istoria familiei lui, prezentindu’i pe fiecare cu bunele si relele lui, m’a rugat sa pastrez tacere cind si’a inceput descrierea aventurilor romantice, m’a incalzit cu modul subtil in care a introdus’o pe ea in scrierea’i si m'a facut sa zimbesc simtind dragaleasenia acestor “tu si cu mine”, “tu si copilul nostru”. Mi’a facut placere aceasta incursiunea pe tarimurile vietii lui Nabokov, luata de mina chiar de el. Da, as mai reveni aici :)

~~~

In acest moment se petrece un lucru incintator. Procesul de reconstituire a tocului si a microcosmosului din ochiul lui magic imi stimuleaza memoria, determinind’o sa faca un ultim efort. Incerc din nou sa’mi amintesc numele cainelui Colettei – si, victorie! De’a lungul acelei plaje indepartate, peste luciul nisipului de seara din trecut, in care fiecare urma de pas se umplea incet cu apa luminata de apusul soarelui, se aud, se aud tot mai aproape, ecoul si vibratia strigatului: Floss! Floss! Floss!

Marturisesc ca nu cred in timp. Imi place sa’mi string covorul fermecat dupa folosinta, in asa fel incit sa suprapun o parte a modelului peste alta. Vizitatorii n’au decit sa se impiedice. Si bucuria cea mai mare a senzatiei de atemporalitate – intr’un peisaj ales la intimplare – o am atunci cind ma aflu printre fluturi rari si uzinele lor de hrana. Pentru mine este un extaz si in spatele extazului mai e ceva, greu de explicat. Este ca un vacuum momentan in care navaleste tot ce iubesc. O senzatie de unicitate cu soare si piatra. Un fior de recunostinta fata de tot ce il produce – fata de geniul contrapunctic al destinului uman sau fata de duhuri care’i fac pe plac unui norocos muritor. ...more

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Aug 08, 2007 Brie rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

He has an absolutely amazing vocabulary which he uses totally un-pretentiously and beautifully. I loved the way that he took forever to tell stories and never really got around to saying anything, and his dry sense of humour was great, as in the game of reminiscences about the writer that he played with his friend, and his descriptions of his tutors. It was really touching the way he adresses his wife in the writing (although without really giving any information about her).

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Jun 22, 2015 Katherine rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 20th-century , biographies-and-memoirs , gilmore-challenge , nonfiction

Nabokov writes like no other. And when I say this, I also mean that no one else could get away with writing like him. The balance he creates between humor and precision in his serious prose is so contemporary, yet would never succeed in our current literary climate were a writer to attempt and replicate it. At times I had to laugh at him for his choice of words, but he could write about anything and make it his own.

In this case though, he's writing about himself. Based on the blurb on the back ...more

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Jan 03, 2015 Nigeyb rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Only the second book I have read by Vladimir Nabokov, the first was the amazing Lolita and, in common with that book, the writing is a delight.

Speak, Memory is a memoir that explores some of Nabokov's recollections. Each chapter is an independent entity and can be read on its own.

The bulk of the chapters recall Nabokov's childhood in an aristocratic family living in pre-revolutionary Saint Petersburg, and at a country estate near Siverskaya. The last three chapters recall his years in Cambridge ...more

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Dec 29, 2014 Lotz rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: prose-style

It is a bit disquieting to review an autobiography. The reviewer struggles to shake the uncomfortable (but not untrue) feeling that one is reviewing not only a book, but a being. The substance and style both stem from the same soul; the content and quality come from the identical individual. The temptation is to offer a slight round of applause, a light pat on the back, and then to move on quietly but quickly. So I hope I don't damage my relationship with Vlad if I confess a vague but unmistakab It is a bit disquieting to review an autobiography. The reviewer struggles to shake the uncomfortable (but not untrue) feeling that one is reviewing not only a book, but a being. The substance and style both stem from the same soul; the content and quality come from the identical individual. The temptation is to offer a slight round of applause, a light pat on the back, and then to move on quietly but quickly. So I hope I don't damage my relationship with Vlad if I confess a vague but unmistakable disappointment with this book. I expect only perfection from Nabokov, and I can’t help being dismayed when he doesn’t quite get there.

Let me skip the obsequious praise of his beautiful prose style and get to the flaw; then I can backtrack. The main flaw of this work is, I think, the lack of the winsome frankness that makes the autobiographical genre special. The story of a writer’s life can’t compete with the life of his stories; if the autobiography is not to be merely to be uneventful novelistic exercise, it has to make up for its lack of excitement with frankness. I don’t mean to join the contemporary cult of honesty, but I see little value in reading a memoir if it doesn’t shed some light—even if that light is tinted and attenuated—on the writer’s mental makeup.

In a word, Nabokov comes across as guarded. Through the narration of events, his privacy is superficially penetrated; yet his prose, so flowing and florid, erects another kind of barrier between us and the man. In his urge to beautify, his writing obscures its object. Reading this book is less like having a chat with him in his living room than sitting down to a magic show. We see only what he wants us to see; through fleet flicks of the wrist, he keeps the strings and springs secret.

It is, then, a testament to his tremendous talent that this book still manages to be, at times, breathtaking. When I wasn’t sitting mouth agape, stunned from his skill, I was almost crushed by envy; his eloquence is so far beyond my puny talents that it seems sensible just to quit and hang up the keyboard. Yet, in-between these ecstatic flashes, I must confess I was often found myself wishing the book would end; I realized, to my own amazement and shame, that I was bored. He didn’t manage to interest me in the progression of his life, nor was I drawn in to learn more about the man himself; and this, I think, is because a sensitive reader can learn almost as much about Nabokov from reading Lolita as from reading this book. Speak, Memory is, in short, far more a work of literature than a confessional.

Alright, fine; I’m exaggerating a little. There are some fascinating glimpses into his artistic process in this work. I particularly liked his irresistibly dorky interest in butterflies. In fact, butterfly catching—the act of sneaking out of the house, net in hand, to chase flighty fairies through fields, in order to kill them and pin them in a display case—forms a handy metaphor for the artistic process: find the parts of life that are both beautiful and elusive, then capture, kill, and display.

Also revealing were Nabokov’s descriptions of composing chess problems. The joy of experiencing a beautiful chess problem reminds me of G.H. Hardy’s descriptions of the joy a mathematician experiences when going through a beautiful proof; it is a purely cerebral joy, born of logic, unmixed with any of the baser human emotions. At this point, I can no longer resist quoting some of Nabokov’s exquisite writing; he is describing the composing process:

It is one thing to conceive the main play of a composition and another to construct it. The strain on the mind is formidable; the element of time drops out of one’s consciousness altogether: the building hand gropes for a pawn in the box, holds it, while the mind still ponders the need for a foil or a stopgap, and when the fist opens, a whole hour, perhaps, has gone by, has burned to ashes in the incandescent cerebration of the schemer. The chessboard before him is a magnetic field, a system of stresses and abysses, a starry firmament. The bishops move over it like searchlights. This or that knight is a lever adjusted and tried, and readjusted and tried again, till the problem is tuned up to the necessary level of beauty and surprise.

I think I would’ve liked this book much more if its focus was on Nabokov’s adult years rather than his childhood. All children are more or less alike; it is as adults that we become interesting, rather than merely promising. I would’ve loved it if Nabokov included some descriptions of his writing process, of how he liked to work, how he decided on a story, how he developed his prose style. But, as I said before, Nabokov is not here to reveal, but to practice poetic prestidigitation. We're lucky he's such a good magician. ...more

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Oct 11, 2008 Lavinia rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: 2008 , journals-biographies-memoirs

Not too many things to say about Nabokov’s memories. It’s just that you discover the writer behind his work (so far Lolita, in my case), daydreaming and wishing you were one of his playmates in that idyllic Russian countryside or my old love, Sankt Petersburg. His incursions into the past, Mnemosina , as he calls his memories, reveal, as I suppose everyone expects, an avid reader or (surprise?) a passionate entomologist, a young man spending his nights solving or creating chess problems or skippi Not too many things to say about Nabokov’s memories. It’s just that you discover the writer behind his work (so far Lolita, in my case), daydreaming and wishing you were one of his playmates in that idyllic Russian countryside or my old love, Sankt Petersburg. His incursions into the past, Mnemosina , as he calls his memories, reveal, as I suppose everyone expects, an avid reader or (surprise?) a passionate entomologist, a young man spending his nights solving or creating chess problems or skipping classes to be with the girl he loves. I really, really liked the passages describing his family, (his father especially), his English nannies or Mademoiselle, Russian tutors or servants. I’m afraid to call him a genius or anything of that sort, as I saw some people did, I just enjoyed reading his memories and now I’m tempted to give a chance to Pnin , Ada or something else.

***

Ca o incununare a celor spuse pina aici, voi prezenta un minunat caz de auz colorat. Poate ca “auz” nu este cuvintul foarte potrivit, de vreme ce senzatia de culoare pare a fi produsa prin insasi actiunea mea orala de a alcatui o anumita litera in timp ce imi imaginez “conturul” ei. “A” lung din alfabetul fonetic englez [si la acest alfabet ma refer mai departe, cu exceptia cazurilor cind precizez ca este un altul] imi evoca tenta lemnului ars de intemperii, in timp ce un “a” frantuzesc imi sugereaza abanos lustruit. Acest grup negru mai include “g” tare [cauciuc vulcanizat] si “r” [o cirpa murdara de funingine care e sfisiiata]. “N”, ca faina de ovaz, “I”, neputincios si prostanac, precum si oglinjoara de mina cu dos de fildes a lui “O”, fac parte din grupul alb. Ma deruteaza frantuzescul “on”, pe care-l vad ca pe suprafata tensionata, care da pe afara, a alcoolului intr-un pahar mic. Trecind la grupul albastru, gasim “x”-ul ca de otel, “z” ca un nor de furtuna si “k” semanind cu merisorul. Intrucit exista o interactiune subtila intre sunet si forma eu il vad pe “q” mai maron decit “k”, in timp ce “s” nu este bleu precum “c”, ci o combinatie ciudata de azuriu cu sidef. Nuantele apropiate nu se contopesc si diftongii nu au culorile lor distincte, decit atunci cind sint reprezentati printr-un singur caracter intr-o alta limba [astfel litera ruseasca gri si pufoasa, cu trei tulpini, reprezentind sunetul "ş", o litera la fel de veche ca apele navalnice ale Nilului, influenteaza reprezentarea ei in engleza].

Ma grabesc sa inchei lista pina nu sint intrerupt. In grupul verde sint: “f”, cel ca frunza de arin, “p”, ca un mar necopt si “t”, de culoarea fisticului. Pentru “w” nu gasesc ceva mai bun decit un verde inchis combinat cu violet. Sunetele galbene includ diversele “e”-uri si “i”-uri, “d”-ul crem, “y”-ul auriu stralucitor si “u”, a carui valoare alfabetica nu o pot exprima decit prin “aramiu cu un luciu masliniu”.

In grupul maron sint: nuanta bogata, cauciucata, a moalelui “g”, aceea mai palida a lui “j” si aceea de sireturi bej a lui “h”. In sfirsit, printre cele rosii, “b”are nuanta denumita de pictori “siena arsa”, “m” este un pliseu de flanel roz iar astazi am gasit echivalentul perfect al lui “v”, acela de “cuart trandafiriu”… ...more

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Mar 16, 2011 Tim Hainley rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

I don't think I was quite in the mood for this. Obviously it's incredibly well-written. I mean, if I was the end result of the breeding of tens of generations of Russian intellectual nobility, I'd probably be a smarty pants too. Sorry, smarty écouter . Still, while I enjoyed the gauzy nostalgia of his childhood, I felt like there was a lot of interesting story I was missing, replaced for some reason by extensive descriptions of butterfly collecting. Sure, it's still Nabokov writing about butterfl ...more

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Jul 31, 2015 Anna rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: study , 2015

I can totally understand why people love this book. His prose is his talent, the sentences are great and reading it is like a sensual enjoyment. I just prefer his fiction. I fail to see why this is one of the greatest memoirs/autobiographies ever written.. I prefer Stefan Zweig's nostalgic account on Vienna, "The World of Yesterday". However, you can't beat Nabokov on writing very beautiful and long senteces.

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About Vladimir Nabokov

Russian: Владимир Владимирович Набоков

Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov, also known by the pen name Vladimir Sirin, was a Russian-American novelist. Nabokov wrote his first nine novels in Russian, then rose to international prominence as a master English prose stylist. He also made significant contributions to lepidoptery and had an interest in chess problems.

Nabokov's Lolita (1955) is frequently cit ...more

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“One is always at home in one's past...” — 62 likes

“The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness. Although the two are identical twins, man, as a rule, views the prenatal abyss with more calm than the one he is heading for (at some forty-five hundred heartbeats an hour). I know, however, of a young chronophobiac who experienced something like panic when looking for the first time at homemade movies that had been taken a few weeks before his birth. He saw a world that was practically unchanged-the same house, the same people- and then realized that he did not exist there at all and that nobody mourned his absence. He caught a glimpse of his mother waving from an upstairs window, and that unfamiliar gesture disturbed him, as if it were some mysterious farewell. But what particularly frightened him was the sight of a brand-new baby carriage standing there on the porch, with the smug, encroaching air of a coffin; even that was empty, as if, in the reverse course of events, his very bones had disintegrated.” — 55 likes

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Trivia About Autres Rivages

Quotes from Speak, Memory: An Aut...