Invitation to a Beheading by Vladimir
Nabokov
Dream Or Reality?
Like Kafkas The Castle, Invitation to a Beheading embodies a vision of a
bizarre and irrational world. In an unnamed dream country, the young man
Cincinnatus C. is condemned to death by beheading for gnostical
turpitude. an imaginary crime that defies definition. Cincinnatus spends his
last days in an absurd jail, where he is visited by chimerical jailers. an
executioner who masquerades as a fellow prisoner, and by his in-laws.
who lug their furniture with them into his cell. When Cincinnatus is led out
to be executed. he simply wills his executioners out of existence: they
disappear, along with the whole world they inhabit.
Ask me any questions you may not have, friends. By mounting the
reviewers scaffold, Ive sentenced myself to reply on behalf of the author,
who is otherwise disposed. Whats this book about, you ask? Why, the
same thing all books are about, you and me. But what happens in it? Thats
an impertinent question! Why should my author be troubled to say what his
book is about when you can read it for yourself. Humble apologies then,
but is there a setting? Oh, there may or may not be a setting, or more
precisely, a sitting, in a cell in a castle across a river from a town of
exceptional ordinariness, but the cell shows all the hallmarks of quan tum
measurability. And characters? Yes, yes, one or more. A certain
Cincinnatus, who bears a close resemblance to Schroedingers cat, is
encapsulated in his cells, as we all are, awaiting his death by beheading
for the crime of gnostical turpitude, of which he would no doubt be guilty if
he knew what it meant. His guard, the guards small daughter, his lawyer,
the warden, his wife and in-laws, his mother whom he doesnt know, and
his executioner-to-be, an outlandish primo donno, all pop in and out of his
cellular anomie like punch-and-judy puppets operated by sadistic voyeurs.
Is the whole tale a fabulation in Cincinnatuss mind? No, of course not.
Cincinnatus is a fabulation in the authors mind. Try to ask more sensible
questions, please! Is this a fable of life in the dungeons of communism?
Thats enough! I cant continue to evade your questions on behalf of Mr.
Nabokov if you dont frame them in surreal terms!
People have said about music that it is the most expressive of arts but that
its impossible to say precisely what it expresses. Nabokovs early writings -
Invitation to a Beheading was written in Russian and published in Paris in
1938 - were immediately compared to the works of Franz Kafka, and
although Nabokov disputes the association, I should think most r eaders
would accept it. A determined reader could demand an either/or of this
Beheading: either the whole thing is a `morbid fantasy in the mind of a
neurasthenic fellow whose name may be Cincinnatus, or the `real
Cincinnatus is absorbed in fretful day dreams which are brought to a final
page only with his actual death. I prefer to dodge either/or questions, being
a musician, and to suggest that Invitation to a Beheading is music, and
therefore means whatever I think it means. You, dear reader, are welcome
to share my musical appreciation.
Heres how Nabokov describes Cincinnatuss departure from his cell en
route to the scaffold: Cincinnatus, who, alas, had suddenly lost the
capacity of walking, was supported by Msieur Pierre [the executioner] and
a soldier with the face of a borzoi. For a very long time they clambered up
and down staircases - the fortress must have suffered a mild stroke, as the
descending stairs were in reality ascending and vice versa. Again there
were long corridors, but of a more inhabited kind; that is, they visibly
demonstrated - either by linoleum, or by wallpaper, or by a sea chest
against the wall - that they adjoined living quarters. At one bend there was
even a smell of cabbage soup. Further on they passed a glass door with
the inscription ffice, and after another period of darkness they abruptly
found themselves in the courtyard, vibrant with the noonday sun.
Now then, dear amazonian book shoppers, youll have to join the throng of
townspeople hastening toward the place of execution in order to sop up
the sanguinary verbiage at the foot of the scaffold.
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