What Do I Read Next?
Last Updated on July 29, 2019, by eNotes Editorial. Word Count: 286
Martin Amis’s Experience: A Memoir (2000) is full of Nabokovian literary allusions and personal anecdotes. The son of writer Kingsley Amis, Martin Amis is a writer-celebrity of rock star proportions in England. Like Speak, Memory: An Autobiography Revisited, Amis’s Experience: A Memoir contains an interesting index and photographs as well as elaborate word play.
Brian Boyd’s Vladimir Nabokov: The Russian Years (1990) and Vladimir Nabokov: The American Years (1991) are thoroughly researched companion volumes that form a complete biography of the man and writer.
Dorothy Day’s The Long Loneliness: An Autobiography (1952) provides an interesting contrast to Nabokov’s autobiography (in both its 1951 and 1966 versions). Day deeply appreciated literature and aesthetic pleasures but remained committed to a socially active, religious life.
An interesting contrast to Nabokov can be found in Wallace Fowlie’s set of four interrelated memoirs published by Duke University Press. Whereas Nabokov was primarily a writer who also taught, Fowlie was a popular professor who also wrote. The titles, in order, are: Journal of Rehearsals: A Memoir (1977), Aubade: A Teacher’s Notebook (1983), Sites: A Third Memoir (1986), and Memory: A Fourth Memoir (1990).
For samples of Vladimir Nabokov’s novels, try Lolita (1955), especially The Annotated Lolita edited by Alfred Appel Jr. (1991), or Ada, or Ardor: A Family Chronicle (1969), which involves a love affair evocative of Nabokov’s with Tamara.
Marcel Proust’s In Search of Lost Time, also known as Remembrance of Things Past, is a magnum opus well worthy of the time spent in reading it. Though numerous versions are available, The Modern Library’s revised 1992 translation by D. J. Enright is recommended.
Stacy Schiff’s Véra (Mrs. Vladimir Nabokov) (2000) provides considerable insight into the married life and collaborative efforts of the Nabokovs.
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