Introduction

Abstract

In Russian, ‘Vladimir’ rhymes with ‘redeemer’ and ‘Nabokov’ with ‘the gawk of’,¹ but deciding where the accent should fall in assessing the novels of this supremely talented Russian-American writer is a somewhat more difficult task. For one thing, his supranational status has been a problem for those attempting to locate him on the literary map. Definitions of contemporary literature as the product of an international or at least a postnational consciousness have proved premature, and the most striking political truth of recent times — that nationalism is still at least as potent a force as any single political ideology — finds its literary counterpart in the refusal of the novel to transcend all the limitations imposed upon it by language and culture.