Selected Poems of Vladimir Nabokov [Hardcover]

Though we know Vladimir Nabokov as a brilliant novelist, his first love was poetry. This landmark collection brings together the best of his verse, including many pieces that have never before appeared in English.

   These poems span the whole of Nabokov’s career, from the newly discovered “Music,” written in 1914, to the short, playful “To Véra,” composed in 1974. Many are newly translated by Dmitri Nabokov, includingThe University Poem, a sparkling novel in verse modeled on Pushkin’sEugene Oneginthat constitutes a significant new addition to Nabokov’s oeuvre. Included too are such poems as “Lilith”, an early work which broaches the taboo theme revisited nearly forty years later inLolita, and “An Evening of Russian Poetry”, a masterpiece in which Nabokov movingly mourns his lost language in the guise of a versified lecture on Russian delivered to college girls. The subjects range from the Russian Revolution to the American refrigerator, taking in on the way motel rooms, butterflies, ice-skating, love, desire, exile, loneliness, language, and poetry itself;and the poet whirls swiftly between the brilliantly painted facets of his genius, wearing masks that are, by turns, tender, demonic, sincere, self-parodying, shamanic, visionary, and ingeniously domestic.

Introduction

Poems Translated by Dmitri Nabokov

MUSIC
REVOLUTION
PETER IN HOLLAND
THE LAST SUPPER
EASTER
THE RULER
THE GLASSES OF ST. JOSEPH
“LIKE PALLID DAWN, MY POETRY SOUNDS GENTLY”
SHAKESPEARE
CUBES
ST. PETERSBURG
EVENING
FORTUNE-TELLING
THE DEMON
THE SKATER
SPRING
DREAM
THE TRAIN WRECK
UT PICTURA POESIS
A TRIFLE
THE UNIVERSITY POEM
BUTTERFLIES
TOLSTOY
“I HAVE NO NEED, FOR MY NOCTURNAL TRAVELS”
TO THE GRAPEFRUIT
THE HAWKMOTH
“FORTY-THREE YEARS, FORTY-FOUR YEARlƒE