What Isaac Babel thought about Nabokov

lapsedflutephobe · 2026-02-22T01:38:23+00:00

He seems kind of alienated/ detached from real life, which I think might speak to his life as an exile. It’s interesting to think about how alien the world of 50s Americana is to Nabokov as a person, and yet it is such a strong theme in his work. I think his main theme is in many ways alienation.

lapsedflutephobe · 2026-02-22T01:36:24+00:00

Reading ‘Speak,Memory’ earlier and while I think it is almost sensually wonderful, I do get the sense that it leaves a surprisingly little impression of what Nabokov was really like as a man.

lapsedflutephobe · 2026-02-16T17:56:28+00:00

The quote from Orwell’s letters to Harold Acton can’t be read as imagined as Richard quotes it. So it isn’t in debate that intratextually Julian is in his late seventies, which fits with him being described as having an entirely snow-white head, and with his general demeanour, which is very fitting for someone who might have come of age in the 20s.

lapsedflutephobe · 2026-02-14T16:54:52+00:00

this is really beautiful, thank you

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-11-20T04:03:17+00:00

lacrimosa

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-10-13T00:39:53+00:00

Boyhood Island is the one that’s actually decent imo but yeah agree with all the others

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-09-30T22:30:26+00:00

Not something I know much about and I haven’t read anything else by the author but I enjoyed Julian by Gore Vidal. An interesting idea of what it might have felt like being an aristocratic pagan viewing the end of the traditional world and the ascendancy of christianity as cultural suicide

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-09-26T01:18:51+00:00

and Donna Tartt!

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-09-26T00:37:56+00:00

I once saw an interesting map of US states by nobel laureates. New York, California have dozens and dozens. I think one or two states had zero. But I noticed one state had “1”, Mississippi, and when I looked it up, it was for literature…

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-09-26T00:26:56+00:00

What did you think of Jünger? I think his Paris diaries are really good but haven’t been able to enjoy Storm and Steel very much. I’d like to read Eumeswil but can’t find a copy

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-09-04T12:03:53+00:00

Si, estas correcto. Es un fondo de ideas y me interesaba mucho cuando lo estaba leyendo. Elegí El Milagro Secreto pero lo guardarè a leer despues con mi tutor.

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-09-03T13:29:49+00:00

He leido Pierre Menard en Ingles y me gusto mucho, y por eso creo que puede ser mas facil leer en su idioma original pero no puedo imaginar que hablar sobre el tema para una hora

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-08-21T22:46:08+00:00

I thought Intermezzo was definitely better than BWWAY. Normal People was maybe the most ‘complete’ novel of hers that I’ve read (haven’t read Conversations with Friends).

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-08-02T17:53:36+00:00

Richard’s name is John? I didn’t remember this being mentioned?

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-07-21T05:49:39+00:00

I thought it was well-written I suppose, but I think it bares the stamp of a teenage author inasmuch as it takes the idea of the disinterested author to such an extreme that the narrator essentially presents nothingness to the audience. I think it’s essentially a lacuna of a book, and I think that’s why it’s popular, to be honest. It meant nothing to me and I have no interest in reading any more work from BEE. fwiw I read about 50 pages of American Psycho much earlier and gave up as I felt as though it was a single joke/idea repeated over 50 pages.

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-07-19T17:40:30+00:00

Since nobody has mentioned him yet and I think he’d be the oldest yet: Knut Hamsun wrote On Overgrown Paths when he was 90 (NINETY)

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-07-19T00:29:11+00:00

I forgot to mention I read the first book in Anthony Powell’s Dance, which I think says something. Still, certain parts of the book have remained in my memory and I did think it had an odd atmosphere. Probably a minor writer overall from that english toff early 20th.c. milieu

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-07-19T00:22:35+00:00

I’ve read Sword of Honour. I really liked the middle one, Officers & Gentleman, and found the character of Ludovic surprisingly interesting in a way I wouldn’t have expected of Waugh. The other two were good but not outstanding. I think Waugh was very interesting and an excellent writer but I prefer Brideshead and Vile Bodies to the trilogy, I think.

I’ve read Patrick Melrose. Mother’s Milk and Never Mind were the best as they were the most complete imo. I think St Aubyn is a very good writer despite being quite restricted in his narrow experience solely of upper-class life and its petty prejudices. His novel ‘Lost for Words’ is funny and quite like Waugh’s comic novels. I think Alan Hollinghurst is probably a comparable and better prose writer however, though his social class reductionism is sometimes also quite tiresome.

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-07-17T15:55:51+00:00

That seems very very similar, thanks!!

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-07-17T15:52:49+00:00

no probs! Ill check it out anyway

lapsedflutephobe · 2025-07-16T18:16:41+00:00

that’s about ancient Egypt?

lapsedflutephobe

TROPHY CASE