The Real Life of Sebastian KnightThe Real Life of Sebastian Knight, Nabokov's first novel in English, was completed in Paris in 1938, first published by New Directions in 1941, reissued in 1959 to wide critical acclaim, and now relaunched again with an appreciative introduction by Pulitzer-Prize winning critic Michael Dirda. This, the narrator tells us, is the real life of famous author Sebastian Knight, the inside story. After Knight's death, his half-brother sets out to penetrate the mystery of the famous English novelist's life, but he is impeded by the false, the distorted, the irreverent. Yet the search proves to be a story quite as intriguing as any of Sebastian Knight's own books, as baffling, and, in the end, as uniquely rewarding. On one level, this literary detective story has pungent points to make about the role of the artist in a society basically hostile to the creative spirit. On another, The Real Life of Sebastian Knight probes the essential problem of the ambiguity of human identity: Just who was Sebastian Knight? |
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asked Beaumont Hotel Bernadette Mayer Blauberg blue called Clare Damier dark dead death door Doubtful Asphodel dream English eyes Ezra Pound face father feeling felt Funny Mountain girl glass Goodman Gorget Graun hand Helene James Joyce kind knew lady Larissa later laughed learnt letters literary lived Lolita looked Lost Property Madame Lecerf Marseilles matter mind minute Miss Pratt mother moved Nabokov never Nikolai Gogol novel once Pahl Pahlich pale Paris past perhaps picture pretty woman Prismatic Bezel queer remember Roquebrune Russian Sebas Sebastian Knight seemed Selected Poems Sheldon shook Silbermann sitting smile soft somehow soul Starov stay stopped story strange suddenly sure talk tell things thought tian told train turned uncon VLADIMIR NABOKOV voice wife woman wonder words write