Pale Fire - Vladimir Nabokov [102]
Charles II, Charles Xavier Vseslav, last King of Zembla, surnamed The Beloved, b. 1915, reigned 1936-1958; his crest, 1; his studies and his reign, 12; fearful fate of predecessors, 62; his supporters, 70; parents, 71; bedroom, 80; escape from palace, 130; and across the mountains, 149; engagement to Disa recalled, 275; parenthetical passage through Paris, 286; and through Switzerland, 408; visit to Villa Disa, 433; night in mountains recalled, 597, 662; his Russian blood, and Crown Jewels (q.v. by all means), 681; his arrival in the U.S.A., 691; letter to Disa stolen, 741; and quoted, 768; his portrait discussed, 894; his presence in library, 949; identity almost revealed, 991; Solus Rex, 1000. See also Kinbote.
Conmal, Duke of Aros, 1855-1955, K.’s uncle, the eldest half-brother of Queen Blenda (q.v.); noble paraphrast, 12; his version of Timon of Athens, 39, 130; his life and work, 962.
Crown Jewels, 130, 681; see Hiding Place.
Disa, Duchess of Payn, of Great Payn and Mone; my lovely, pale, melancholy Queen, haunting my dreams, and haunted by dreams of me, b. 1928; her album and favorite trees, 49; married 1949, 80; her letters on ethereal paper with a watermark I cannot make out, her image torturing me in my sleep, 433.
Embla, a small old town with a wooden church surrounded by sphagnum bogs at the saddest, loneliest, northmost point of the misty peninsula, 149, 433.
Emblem, meaning “blooming” in Zemblan; a beautiful bay with bluish and black, curiously striped rocks and a luxurious growth of heather on its gentle slopes, in the southmost part of W. Zembla, 433.
Falkberg, a pink cone, 71; snowhooded, 149.
Flatman, Thomas, 1637–88, English poet, scholar and miniaturist, not known to old fraud, 894.
Fleur, Countess de Fyler, an elegant lady-in-waiting, 71, 80, 433.
G, see Gradus.
Garh, a farmer’s daughter, 149, 433. Also a rosy-cheeked goose-boy found in a country lane, north of Troth, in 1936, only now distinctly recalled by the writer.
Glitterntin, Mt., a splendid mountain in the Bera Range (q.v.); pity I may never climb it again, 149.
Gordon, see Krummholz.
Gradus, Jakob, 1915-1959; alias Jack Degree, de Grey, d’Argus, Vinogradus, Leningradus, etc.; a Jack of small trades and a killer, 12, 17; lynching the wrong people, 80; his approach synchronized with S’s work on the poem, 120, 131; his election and past tribulations, 171; the first lap of his journey, Onhava to Copenhagen, 181, 209; to Paris, and meeting with Oswin Bretwit, 286; to Geneva, and talk with little Gordon at Joe Lavender’s place near Lex, 408; calling headquarters from Geneva, 469; his name in a variant, and his wait in Geneva, 596; to Nice, and his wait there, 697; his meeting with Izumrudov in Nice and discovery of the King’s address, 741; from Paris to New York, 873; in New York, 9491; his morning in New York, his journey to New Wye, to the campus, to Dulwich Rd., 9492; the crowning blunder, 1000.
Griff, old mountain farmer and Zemblan patriot, 149.
Grindelwod, a fine town in E. Zembla, 71, 149.
Hiding place, potaynik (q.v.)
Hodinski, Russian adventurer, d. 1800, also known as Hodyna, 681; resided in Zembla 1778-1800; author of a celebrated pastiche and lover of Princess (later Queen) Yaruga (q.v.), mother of Igor II, grandmother of Thurgus (q.v.).
Igor II, reigned 1800-1845, a wise and benevolent king, son of Queen Yaruga (q.v.) and father of Thurgus III (q.v.); a very private section of the picture gallery in the Palace, accessible only to the reigning monarch, but easily broken into through Bower P by an inquisitive pubescent, contained the statues of Igor’s four hundred favorite catamites, in pink marble, with inset glass eyes and various touched up details, an outstanding exhibition of verisimilitude and bad art, later presented by K. to an Asiatic potentate.
K, see Charles II and Kinbote.
Kalixhaven, a colorful seaport on the western coast, a few miles north of Blawick (q.v.), 171; many pleasant memories.