Faragod: apparently, the god of electricity.
p.20. braques: allusion to a bric-à-brac painter.
p.23. entendons-nous: let’s have it clear (Fr.).
p.24. Yukonets: inhabitant of Yukon (Russ.).
p.25. lammer: amber (Fr: l’ambre), allusion to electricity.
p.25. my lad, my pretty, etc: paraphrase of a verse in Housman.
p.25. ballatetta: fragmentation and distortion of a passage in a ‘little ballad’ by the Italian poet Guido Cavalcanti (1255-1300). The relevant lines are: ‘you frightened and weak little voice that comes weeping from my woeful heart, go with my soul and that ditty, telling of a destroyed mind.’
p.27. Nuss: German for ‘nut’.
p.28. Khristosik: little Christ (Russ.).
p.28. rukuliruyushchiy: Russ., from Fr. roucoulant, cooing.
p.29. horsepittle: ‘hospital’, borrowed from a passage in Dickens’ Bleak House. Poor Joe’s pun, not a poor Joycean one.
p.30. aujourd’hui, heute: to-day (Fr., Germ.).
p.30. Princesse Lointaine: Distant Princess, title of a French play.
p.31. pour attraper le client: to fool the customer.
p.34. Je parie, etc.: I bet you do not recognize me, Sir.
p.35. tour du jardin: a stroll in the garden.
p.36. Lady Amherst: confused in the child’s mind with the learned lady after whom a popular pheasant is named.
p.36. with a slight smile: a pet formula of Tolstoy’s denoting cool superiority, if not smugness, in a character’s manner of speech.
p.37. pollice verso: Lat., thumbs down.
p.39. Sumerechnikov: the name is derived from ‘sumerki’ (‘dusk’ in Russian).
p.42. lovely Spanish poem: really two poems — Jorge Guillén’s Descanso en jardin and his El otono: isla).
p.44. Monsieur a quinze ans, etc.: You are fifteen, Sir, I believe, and I am nineteen, I know…. You, Sir, have known town girls no doubt; as to me, I’m a virgin, or almost one. Moreover…
p.44. rien qu’une petite fois: just once.
p.45. mais va donc jouer avec lui: come on, go and play with him.
p.45. se morfondre: mope.
p.45. au fond: actually.
p.45. Je l’ignore: I don’t know.
p.45. cache-cache: hide-and-seek.
p.46. infusion de tilleul: lime tea.
p.48. Les amours du Dr Mertvago: play on ‘Zhivago’ (‘zhiv’ means in Russian ‘alive’ and ‘mertv’ dead).
p.48. grand chêne: big oak.
p.49. quelle idée: the idea!
p.50. Les malheurs de Swann: cross between Les malheurs de Sophie by Mme de Ségur (née Countess Rostopchin) and Proust’s Un amour de Swann.
p.53. monologue intérieur: the so-called ‘stream-of-consciousness’ device, used by Leo Tolstoy (in describing, for instance, Anna’s last impressions whilst her carriage rolls through the streets of Moscow).
p.56. Mr Fowlie: see Wallace Fowlie, Rimbaud (1946).
p.56. soi-disant: would-be.
p.56. les robes vertes, etc.: the green and washed-out frocks of the little girls.
p.56. angel moy: Russ., ‘my angel’.
p.57. en vain. etc.: In vain, one gains in play
The Oka river and Palm Bay…
p.57. bambin angélique: angelic little lad.
p.59. groote: Dutch, ‘great’.
p.59. un machin etc.: a thing as long as this that almost wounded the child in the buttock.
p.60. pensive reeds: Pascal’s metaphor of man, un roseau pensant.
p.61. horsecart: an old anagram. It leads here to a skit on Freudian dream charades (‘symbols in an orchal orchestra’), p.62.
p.61. buvard: blotting pad.
p.62. Kamargsky: La Camargue, a marshy region in S. France combined with Komar, ‘mosquito’, in Russian and moustique in French.
p.63. sa petite collation du matin: light breakfast.
p.64. tartine au miel: bread-and-butter with honey.
p.64. Osberg: another good-natured anagram, scrambling the name of a writer with whom the author of Lolita has been rather comically compared. Incidentally, that title’s pronunciation has nothing to do with English or Russian (pace an anonymous owl in a recent issue of the TLS).
p.65. mais ne te etc.: now don’t fidget like that when you put on your skirt! A well-bred little girl…
p.65. très en beauté: looking very pretty.
p.66. calèche: victoria.
p.66. pecheneg: a savage.
p.67. grande fille: girl who has reached puberty.
p.69. La Rivière de Diamants: Maupassant and his ‘La Parure’ (p.73) did not exist on Antiterra.
p.70. copie etc.: copying in their garret.
p.70. à grand eau: swilling the floors.
p.70. désinvolture: uninhibitedness.
p.70. vibgyor: violet-indigo-blue-green-yellow-orange-red.
p.72. sans façons: unceremoniously.
p.72. strapontin: folding seat in front.
p.73. décharné: emaciated.
p.73. cabane: hut.
p.73. allons donc: oh, come.
p.73. pointe assassine: the point (of a story or poem) that murders artistic merit.
p.73. quitte à tout dire etc.: even telling it all to the widow if need be.
p.73. il pue: he stinks.
p.74. Atala: a short novel by Chateaubriand.
p.75. un juif: a Jew.
p.76. et pourtant: and yet.
p.76. ce beau jardin etc.: This beautiful garden blooms in May, but in Winter never, never, never, never, never is green etc.
p.78. chort!: Russ., ‘devil’.
p.83. mileyshiy: Russ., ‘dearest’.
p.83. partie etc.: exterior fleshy part that frames the mouth… the two edges of a simple wound… it is the member that licks.
p.84. pascaltrezza: in this pun, which combines Pascal with caltrezza (Ital., ‘sharp wit’) and treza (a Provençal word for ‘tressed stalks’), the French ‘pas’ negates the ‘pensant’ of the ‘roseau’ in his famous phrase ‘man is a thinking reed’.
p.86. Katya: the ingénue in Turgenev’s ‘Fathers and Children’.
p.86. a trouvaille: a felicitous find.
p.86. Ada who liked crossing orchids: she crosses here two French authors, Baudelaire and Chateaubriand.
p.86. mon enfant, etc.: my child, my sister, think of the thickness of the big oak at Tagne, think of the mountain, think of the tenderness —
p.87. recueilli: concentrated, rapt.
p.87. canteen: a reference to the ‘scrumpets’ (crumpets) provided by school canteens.
p.90. puisqu’on etc.: since we broach this subject.
p.91. hument: inhale.
p.92. tout le reste: all the rest.
p.92. zdravstvuyte etc.: Russ., lo and behold: the apotheosis
p.92. Mlle Stopchin: a representative of Mme de Ségur, née Rostopchine, author of Les Malheurs de Sophie (nomenclatorially occupied on Antiterra by Les Malheurs de Swann).
p.92. au feu!: fire!
p.92. flambait: was in flames.
p.92. Ashette: ‘Cendrillon’ in the French original.
p.93. en croupe: riding pillion.
p.94. à reculons: backwards.
p.97. The Nile is settled: a famous telegram sent by an African explorer.
p.97. parlez pour vous: speak for yourself.
p.97. trempée: soaked.
p.101. je l’ai vu etc.: ‘I saw it in one of the wastepaper-baskets of the library.’
p.101. aussitôt après: immediately after.
p.102. ménagez etc.: go easy on your Americanisms.
p.103. leur chute etc.: their fall is slow… one can follow them with one’s eyes, recognizing —
p.103. Lowden: a portmanteau name combining two contemporary bards.
p.103. baguenaudier: French name of bladder senna.
p.103. Floeberg: Flaubert’s style is mimicked in this pseudo quotation.
p.105. pour ne pas etc.: so as not to put any ideas in her head.
p.105. en lecture: ‘out’.
p.105. cher, trop cher René: dear, too dear (his sister’s words in Chateaubriand’s René).
p.106. Chiron: doctor among centaurs: an allusion to Updike’s best novel.
p.106. London Weekly: a reference to Alan Brien’s New Statesman column.
p.106. Höhensonne: ultra-violet lamp.
p.107. bobo: little hurt.
p.107. démission etc.: tearful notice.
p.107. les deux enfants etc.: ‘therefore the two children could make love without any fear’.
p.108. fait divers: news item.
p.109. blin: Russ., pancake.
p.109. qui le sait: who knows.
p.110. Heinrich Müller: author of Poxus, etc.
p.111. Ma soeur te souvient-il encore: first line of the third sextet of Chateaubriand’s Romance à Hélène (‘Combien j’ai douce souvenance’) composed to an Auvergne tune that he heard during a trip to Mont Dore in 1805 and later inserted in his novella Le Dernier Abencerage. The final (fifth) sextet begins with ‘Oh! qui me rendra mon Hélène. Et ma montagne et le grand chêne’ — one of the leitmotivs of the present novel.
p.111. sestra moya etc.: my sister, do you remember the mountain, and the tall oak, and the Ladore?
p.111. oh! qui me rendra etc.: oh who will give me back my Aline, and the big oak, and my hill?
p.112. Lucile: the name of Chateaubriand’s actual sister.
p.112. la Dore etc.: the Dore and the agile swallow.
p.112. vendage: vine-harvest.
p.114. Rockette: corresponds to Maupassant’s La Petite Rocque.
p.114. chaleur du lit: bed warmth.
p.115. horosho: Russ., all right.
p.117. mironton etc.: burden of a popular song.
p.118. Lettrocalamity: a play on Ital. elettrocalamita, electromagnet.
p.121. Bagrov’s grandson: allusion to Childhood Years of Bagrov’s Grandson by the minor writer Sergey Aksakov (A.D. 1791-1859).
p.122. hobereaux: country squires.
p.122. biryul’ki proshlago: Russ., the Past’s baubles.
p.124. traktir: Russ., pub.
p.124. (avoir le) vin triste: to be melancholy in one’s cups.
p.124. au cou rouge etc.: with the ruddy and stout neck of a widower still full of sap.
p.124. gloutonnerie: gourmandise.
p.125. tant pis: too bad.
p.125. je rêve etc.: I must be dreaming. It cannot be that anyone should spread butter on top of all that indigestible and vile British dough.
p.125. et ce n’est que etc.: and it is only the first slice.
p.125. lait caillé!: curds and whey.
p.125. shlafrok: Russ., from Germ. Schlafrock, dressing gown.
p.126. tous les etc.: all the tires are new.
p.126. tel un: thus a wild lily entrusting the wilderness.
p.126. non etc.: no, Sir, I simply am very fond of you, Sir, and of your young lady.
p.127. qu’y puis-je? what can I do about it?
p.128. Stumbling on melons… arrogant fennels: allusions to passages in Marvell’s ‘Garden’ and Rimbaud’s ‘Mémoire’.
p.130. d’accord: Okay.
p.133. la bonne surprise: what a good surprise.
p.134. amour propre, sale amour: pun borrowed from Tolstoy’s ‘Resurrection’.
p.135. quelque petite etc.: some little laundress.
p.135. Toulouse: Toulouse-Lautrec.
p.136. dura: Russ., fool (fem.).
p.136. The Headless Horseman: Mayn Reid’s title is ascribed here to Pushkin, author of The Bronze Horseman.
p.136. Lermontov: author of The Demon.
p.137. Tolstoy etc.: Tolstoy’s hero, Haji Murad, (a Caucasian chieftain) is blended here with General Murat, Napoleon’s brother-in-law, and with the French revolutionary leader Marat assassinated in his bath by Charlotte Corday.
p.138. Lute: from ‘Lutèce’, ancient name of Paris.
p.139. constatait etc.: noted with pleasure.
p.140. Shivering aurora, laborious old Chose: a touch of Baudelaire.
p.142. golubyanka: Russ., small blue butterfly.
p.142. petit bleu: Parisian slang for pneumatic post (an express message on blue paper).
p.142. cousin: mosquito.
p.143. mademoiselle etc.: the young lady has a pretty bad pneumonia, I regret to say, Sir.
p.143. Granial Maza: a perfume named after Mt Kazbek’s ‘gran’ almuza’ (diamond’s facet) of Lermontov’s The Demon.
p.145. inquiétante: disturbing.
p.148. Yellow-blue Vass: the phrase is consonant with ya lyublyu vas, (‘I love you’ in Russian).
p.150. mais, ma pauvre amie etc.: but, my poor friend, it was imitation jewellery.
p.151. nichego ne podelaesh’: Russ., nothing to be done.
p.151. elle le mangeait