winesburg, ohio

your daily whimsy.

maudnewton:

… my favorite Nabokov cat story? His “diagram of the themes of Bleak House”:

“I want you to copy this exactly as I draw it,” Vladimir Nabokov instructed us…. He turned to the blackboard, picked up a piece of chalk, and scrawled “the theme of inheritance” in a weird arching loop. “The theme of generations” dipped and rose and dipped in an undulating line. “The theme of social consciousness” wiggled crazily toward the other lines, then veered sharply away.

Nabokov turned from the blackboard and peered over the rims of his glasses, parodying a professorial twinkle. “I want you to be sure to copy this exactly as I draw it.”

After consulting a piece of paper on the lectern, he turned back to the blackboard and scrawled “the theme of economic conditions” in a nearly vertical line. “The theme of poverty,” “the theme of political (the chalk snapped under the pressure, he picked up another piece and continued) protest,” “the theme of social environment” — all leaping and dipping wildly across the blackboard. Some people simply can’t draw a straight line.

Again he peered at us, over his shoulder and over his glasses, in silent reminder to copy this “exactly.”

And finally he scrawled the last “theme” in a neat dipping curve, a half-moon on its side, and we suddenly realized he had drawn a cat’s face, the last line its wry smile, and for the rest of the term that cat smiled out of our notebooks in mockery of the didactic approach to literature.

(via miettecast)