Customer Reviews

Pnin

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There are those who love Nabokov, and those who haven't figured him out yet. Pnin is a good "Starter Book" for most people: the writing is not yet too convoluted, nor are there too many layers of meaning (seemingly) to confuse the timid. It seems such a simple tale: a slightly clumsy professor, who is a bit of a fool with such a funny accent. So quaint. So cute.

Good readers realize that Nabokov has squirreled away (so to speak) some of his most potent messages: Pnin is possibly his most noble and kind soul in his canon (which is to say a Big Bertha): Pnin is a profound scholar, a man of enormous passion and commitment, a perfect father to his ex-wife's son to another man, still devoted to her despite her crassness, really a mensch. And hovering over and around this tale the Emigre milieu in the mid 20th Century is encapsulated and preserved as refulgently as the White Russian world of Berlin was captured in "The Gift".

I read this dreadful paperback edition when I was a child the age of Victor in the book when he gave Pnin the glass bowl: the ridiculous image of the young coeds and the silly depiction of Pnin are horribly, terribly nostalgic to me now... I would have anything to have it back!