In this novel's forward its author claims it would have been published earlier in the US if not for an overeager publisher who wanted its protagonist changed into a "demented violinist.
In this novel's forward its author claims it would have been published earlier in the US if not for an overeager publisher who wanted its protagonist changed into a "demented violinist." That is deeply affected by a poster of a man hanging from a skyscraper ledge, which is probably a still from Harold Lloyd's 1923 film Safety Last. That poster is found at Veritas Studios, where a film producer who was the protagonist's former mentor asks him to appear in a movie. The protagonist's father Ivan is a children's book writer who sends his son off to the promoter Valentinov. Its protagonist meets his wife at a German health resort and asks her to marry him before his showdown with (*) Turati in Berlin. In this novel's culminating revelation, its protagonist realizes that every life event he has had since his nervous breakdown echoes a similar event from his childhood, and that only by committing suicide he can break the pattern. That central motif was strongly informed by its author's fondness for creating and solving chess puzzles. For 10 points, name this novel about a chess master who kills himself, a work of Vladimir Nabokov.
In this novel's forward its author claims it would have been published earlier in the US if not for an overeager publisher who wanted its protagonist changed into a "demented violinist.
The {Defense} [or {Luzhin’s Defense}]