Creative Freedom in Nabby and the Pynch

[Terrance]

> VN: [...] The middlebrow or the upper Philistine cannot get rid of the
> furtive feeling that a book, to be great, must deal in great ideas.  Oh,
> I know the type, the dreary type!  He likes a good yarn spiced with
> social comment; he likes to recognize his own thoughts and throws in
> those of the author; he wants at least one of the characters to be the
> author's stooge.  If American, he has a dash of Marxist blood, and if
> British, he is acutely and ridiculously class-conscious; he finds it so
> much easier to write about ideas than about words; he does not realize
> that perhaps the reason he does not find general ideas in a particular
> writer is that the particular ideas of that writer have not yet become
> general." (p 41)



  Since the master artist uses his imagination in
  creating his book, it is natural and fair that the
  consumer of a book should use his imagination too. 
  There are, however, at least two varieties of
  imagination in the reader's case. So let us see which
  one of the two is the right one to use in reading a
  book. First, there is the comparatively low kind which
  turns to support to the simple emotions and is of a
  definitely personal nature. (There are various
  subvarities here, in this first section of emotional
  reading). A situation in a book is deeply felt because
  it reminds of us of something that happened to us or
  someone we know or knew. Or, again, a reader treasures
  a book mainly because it evokes a country, a
  landscape, a mode of living which he nostalgically
  recalls as part of his own past. Or, and this is the
  worst thing a reader can do, he identifies himself
  with a character in the book. This lowly variety is
  not the kind of imagination I would like readers to
  use. 

  VN LOL.4

 

  N says, it is natural and fair that the reader  of a
  book should use his imagination. While  N's
 Lectures  are focused on the admittedly important
  question of how books differ in their ability to
  produce a tingling in the spine of the reader, in this
  Introductory lecture, Nabokov is focused on the reader
  and reading. N's ideal reader is not passive. He needs
  to use his imagination. To match the intensity and
  immensity of a master writer, a reader needs to toss
  off the self-image of
  the passive reader receiving shocks from verbal
  stimuli. Only then can the quality of the work be
  realized. This is why Nabokov emphasizes reading for
  details and RE-reading. N stresses that a good reader
  pays close attention to details and the world the
  author creates. Does Little Buttercup have red hair or
  blonde? Is Benny Profane left-handed? Does Slothrop
  have a beer belly? And, the reader must pay close
  attention to the qualitative nuances produced while
  reading. These are produced not simply or only by the
  words arranged on the page by the author, but also by
  the reader's judicious managing of his responses to
  them.  

  The reader's response to the verbal stimuli is
  ephemeral and personal and it can not be held static
  so that it may be evaluated  with any degree of
  thoroughness. While reading, the author's words
  commingle with the stuff of reader's imagination and
  memory. This experience is unique for each reader and
  it cannot be shared directly with anyone. Someone else
  cannot directly evaluate it. It is transitory. It has
  an inward character. Nevertheless, when we discuss
  literature we must have recourse to memory and that
  inward imaginative stuff. Anathema though these may be
  to those who seek to argue some objectivity, these are
  essential components of the imaginative processes of both 
readers and writers.