Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Pale Fire + Commentary on lines 47-48

"The fragile vista, the frame house between
Goldsworth and Wordsmith on its square of green" (p 34)                                                                                                                                                                                      In Kinbote's commentary of these two lines (found between pages 82-93), he launches into a lengthy commentary that ranges from discussing subjects like Judge Goldsworth/his home/family, Kinbote's "maintence" of Goldsworth mansion (i.e. moving furniture/curtains to minimize sun damage), Kinbote spying on the Shades, seeing a young priest commune with God (p 88), intruding on the Shades when John Shade is reading canto two aloud to Sybil (Hazel's death), his unwelcome entrance into their home, description of the lay-out of New Wye (various homes, lakes, the University, football field, etc.). All this ended with the phrase "Dear Jesus, do something."                                                 
                                                                                                                     
Needless to say, it was quite overwhelming to try to absorb what felt like one giant run on sentence/train of thought but then to have ended it with the phrase "Dear Jesus, do something" is something different all together. Is Kinbote (Botkin) jealous of the creative/almost divine inspiration that John Shade uses on a daily basis to compose his poem an therefore appeals to Jesus at the end of his long winded commentary so he too can experience "divine inspiration" like the young, Zemblan priest/John Shade had? Or is the addition of this phrase merely a frame that reinforces Kinbote's "madness"? Kinbote seems lacks the trait of editing down one's thoughts/stream of consciousness in order to appeal to a wider audience by conveying one's ideas, stories, etc. concisely.

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