Five... historic London writers, bitchily critiqued by Vladimir Nabokov
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Hi and welcome to your weekend newsletter…
This edition’s a bitesize one as I’m on the road this weekend: five of the outstandingly petty takes on renowned London authors from Vladimir Nabokov — author of Lolita, Pale Fire, and among other works, Strong Opinions, the 1973 collection of articles, interviews and also the long, impressively catty list of his opinions about various writers I’ve taken these from.
The list’s not London-focused, with Nabokov laying pretty evenhandedly into titans of fiction from different countries, eras and genres: Dostoevsky’s a ‘claptrap journalist and a slapdash comedian’; William Faulkner’s ‘a writer of corncobby chronicles’. Bertolt Brecht? ‘A nonentity. Means absolutely nothing to me.’ It’s not exclusively hostile, with occasional praise scattered into the mix, but even the ‘praise’ isn’t necessarily going to leave you with a warm cosy feeling if, say, you’re Hemingway (‘Certainly better than Conrad. Has at least a voice of his own. Nothing I would care to have written myself.’) or Chekhov (‘Talent but not genius.’)
You can read the full list here, but below’s a handful of the more brutal bodyslams Nabokov aims at London authors from across the centuries.1
