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Letters to V�ra Hardcover – 2014

by
Vladimir Nabokov (Author)
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Vladimir Nabokov (Author), Olga Voronina (Editor),
Brian Boyd (Editor)
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Brian Boyd (Editor)
4.5 out of 5 stars 11 customer reviews
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Product Details

  • Hardcover
  • Publisher: Penguin Books (2014)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0141192232
  • ISBN-13: 978-0141192239
  • Product Dimensions: 6.4 x 2.1 x 9.4 inches
  • Shipping Weight: 3.1 pounds
  • Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #964,891 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Top Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 starsA Bottle of Ink, a Speck of Sun, and You
By Elena Danielson on January 16, 2015
Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase
Given Nabokov's penchant for creating a fictitious persona to present to the world, his early letters are a rare glimpse of the man before he has achieved wealth, fame, and a polished facade. These letters to Vera, small masterpieces, are a rare gift.

This review should come with a warning: I'm highly conflicted about the works of Vladimir Nabokov. In a college class I was once asked to read a selection of paragraphs by various famous authors, without knowing the authors' actual names. I loved all of the selections with the exception of one hideously overwrought landscape description, that was clearly pure kitsch. To this day I despise the source of the quote: Nabokov's "Lolita." Yet one of my all time favorite books is his "Speak Memory." Another is "The Gift." How could the same writer produce both styles?

When I read Brian Boyd's masterful biography of Nabokov, I loved volume 1 about Nabokov the Russian writer, and hated volume 2 about Nabokov the American novelist. Not because of Boyd, but because of the subject. After achieving wealth and fame with "Lolita," Nabokov's self presentations in interviews are particularly egregious: dishonest, arrogant, and great fun to read. Nabokov delighted in hoaxes, doubles, mimicry, and disguises. So I'm grateful that Brian Boyd, with his wealth of knowledge about the "real" Nabokov, was willing to work with the translator Olga Voronina on annotating Nabokov's "Letters to Vera," his fiercely devoted wife. While fact-oriented, Boyd is still dutifully respectful of both the author and his wife. Michael Maar's "Speak, Nabokov," is a useful antidote to the usual hagiography. Maar was the first to point out the obscure German work by Lichberg that foreshadows "Lolita" in terms of subject matter and title.Read more ›
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4.0 out of 5 starsOne way traffic
By H. Schneider on December 3, 2015
Format: Kindle Edition
This volume of Nabokov's letters to Véra, his wife of over 50 years, is literally that: his letters to her, none in return. She destroyed all hers. She was also a lazy correspondent, as per his complaints. We can't verify that.
Why write letters at all? After the couple met in Berlin in the 1920s, there were periods of separation, some due to his work, or visits to his mother, some due to her health. After the family had escaped to America, separations became rare, due to stable jobs and then the Lolita wealth. In consequence, the major part of the letter collection is from the younger, European years.

What stands out is the intensity of endearments. The couple never 'matured' out of that stage. Good for them. It doesn't do equally much for the reader though. We notice the magic, and we are happy for them, but did we need to keep peeping?
What does he write to her about? Mostly about his days. Weather. Food. Family. Books. People. Places. Tennis. Swimming. And he sends her puzzles, cross words, word riddles. This is sometimes interesting, in bits and pieces, but it doesn't show us new sides of the man. We do get the occasional fireworks of words, and that aspect is very fine.
By the 1930s, more and more letters read like business letters: she had gradually become more than his confidente, but would also be more and more his manager, assistant, secretary, agent, organizer, driver, understudy. These business letters may be valuable for historians of detail, but I find them rather dull.

That changes in 1937, which is the dramatic high point. He is looking for a place to move to, in England or France, and she must leave Berlin with the little son. They will move out of Germany and then out of France 'just in time'. There is tension in his letters.Read more ›
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5.0 out of 5 starsThe Softer Side Of A Great Wriiter
By thirdtwin on June 12, 2016
Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase
These letters reveal a side of Nabokov seldom if ever seen by the reading public; and get us closer to a sense of the real man behind all the persona he adopted in his fiction and also in most of his interviews actually. But we only get half the correspondence here because Vera saw fit to destroy or at least not publish her side of the letters- there is a huge Nabokov family archive so only they know what other papers exist that haven't been printed. Worth a look if you want to see the man stripped of some his pretension.
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5.0 out of 5 starsThis is just the perfect glimpse into the life of such a dynamic writer
By MMalone on June 28, 2016
Format: Paperback Verified Purchase
This is just the perfect glimpse into the life of such a dynamic writer. The prose and poems he wrote to Vera seem to be effortlessly written and so poignant.

It is well translated.
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4.0 out of 5 starshuge book
By will crow on January 31, 2015
Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase
a tome of literature. this amazing collection is a 40 lb book of huge scope and density. i put it on my back and do pushups, it's a weightlifter's dream. oh, and beautifully written.
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5.0 out of 5 starsFive Stars
By Kiki on December 15, 2015
Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase
LOVE this book. Super romantic
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