Vladimir Nabokov

" I remember a cartoon depicting a chimney sweep falling from the roof of a tall building and noticing on the way that a signboard had one word spelled wrong, and wondering in his headlong flight why nobody had thought of correcting it. In a sense, we all are crashing to our death from the top story of our birth to the flat stones of the churchyard and wondering with an immortal Alice in Wonderland at the patterns of the passing wall. This capacity to wonder at trifles—no matter the imminent peril—these asides of the spirit, these footnotes in the volume of life are the highest forms of consciousness, and it is in this childishly speculative state of mind, so different from common sense and its logic, that we know the world to be good. "
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Vladimir Nabokov
Consciousness , Good
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" Coordinating thereEvents and objects with remote eventsAnd vanished objects. Making ornamentsOf accidents and possibilities. "
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Vladimir Nabokov
Possibility , accident
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" Who grins in official circumstances? "
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Vladimir Nabokov
Hilarious
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" Life is a great surprise. I do not see why death should not be an even greater one. "
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Vladimir Nabokov
Death , Dying
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Vladimir Nabokov
born: died: occupation: cite this page:
22-04-1899 02-07-1977 Novelist, Entomologist, Translator, Professor citation
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