Nabokov and The Wolf-Man

Lee, Byung Wook

Abstract

Vladimir Nabokov (1899-1977) was a famous Russian-born American writer, but extraordinarily he was scornful to Freudian psychoanalysis. His unusually contemptuous attitude to Freud has been enigmatic until this time, but it might be a kind of allergic reaction originated from his personal problems. Specifically he seemed likely to be stimulated by the Wolf-Man case who had a common background in each other socially and psychologically. Sergei Pankejeff (1887-1979) known as the Wolf-Man was a fan of Freud, but ambivalent to psychoanalysis. Their contrary positions to Freud can be regarded as negative or positive transference reactions. They were the ruined peers due to the Russian revolution, and psychologically traumatized by sudden tragic deaths of their fathers. But the Wolf-Man was more unhappy relatively because he experienced a train of misfortunes due to suicides of his sister, father, and wife. Otherwise Nabokov was fully rewarded by his dedicated wife and his successful fame although his private life was not alive or bright. He was a fanatic butterfly-hunter and preoccupied to chess problems unlike the Wolf-Man with butterfly phobia in childhood. Nabokov revealed a kind of pedophilic preoccupation to precious girl, and dealt with the middle-aged man ruined by a femme fatale in his major novels [Laughter in the Dark] and [Lolita]. Nabokov seemed to act out his pedophilic fantasy into the protagonist's behavior in his fictional world, and into butterfly hunting and study in his real world. Butterfly means little fickle girl and rebirth symbolically. Nabokov seemed to chase after two things simultaeneously for the sake of his restoration of the lost childhood with sexual trauma. In my speculation, Nabokov was stimulated and irritated by the Wolf-Man case, and hence he showed the strongly disdainful allergic reaction to Freud. It was the most merciless contempt for psychoanalysis in modern literature.