Nabokov's first novel in English, one of his greatest and most overlooked

Biographer follows an elusive trail across Europe and uncovers the secret of a Russian woman who had ruined the life of his half-brother, an English novelist.

Spurred on by admiration for his novelist half-brother and irritation at the biography written about him by Mr Goodman ('his slapdash and very misleading book'), the narrator, V, sets out to record Sebastian Knight's life as he understands it. But buried amid the extensive quoting, digressions, seeming explanations and digs, Sebastian's erratic and troubled persona remains as elusive as ever. Nabokov's first novel written in English, The Real Life of Sebastian Knight is a nuanced, enigmatic potrayal of the conflict between the real and the unreal, and the futile quest for human truth.

In Nabokov and Indeterminacy, Priscilla Meyer shows how Vladimir Nabokov’s early novel The Real Life of Sebastian Knight illuminates his later work. Meyer first focuses on Sebastian Knight, exploring how Nabokov associates his characters with systems of subtextual references to Russian, British, and American literary and philosophical works. She then turns to Lolita and Pale Fire, applying these insights to show that these later novels clearly differentiate the characters through subtextual references, and that Sebastian Knight’s construction models that of Pale Fire. Meyer argues that the dialogue Nabokov constructs among subtexts explores his central concern: the continued existence of the spirit beyond bodily death. She suggests that because Nabokov’s art was a quest for an unattainable knowledge of the otherworldly, knowledge which can never be conclusive, Nabokov’s novels are never closed in plot, theme, or resolution—they take as their hidden theme the unfinalizability that Bakhtin says characterizes all novels. The conclusions of Nabokov's novels demand a rereading, and each rereading yields a different novel. The reader can never get back to the same beginning, never attain a conclusion, and instead becomes an adept of Nabokov’s quest. Meyer emphasizes that, unlike much postmodern fiction, the contradictions created by Nabokov’s multiple paths do not imply that existence is constructed arbitrarily of pre-existing fragments, but rather that these fragments lead to an ever-deepening approach to the unknowable.

Novels 1969 1974, Ada, Transparent Things, Look at the Harlequins.

The Real Life of Sebastian Knight is a perversely magical literary detective story -- subtle, intricate, leading to a tantalizing climax -- about the mysterious life of a famous writer. Many people knew things about Sebastian Knight as a distinguished novelist, but probably fewer than a dozen knew of the two love affairs that so profoundly influenced his career, the second one in such a disastrous way. After Knight's death, his half brother sets out to penetrate the enigma of his life, starting with a few scanty clues in the novelist's private papers. His search proves to be a story as intriguing as any of his subject's own novels, as baffling, and, in the end, as uniquely rewarding. "Nabokov writes prose the only way it should be written, that is, ecstatically." -John Updike

Ranked 2nd [after James Joyce's Ulysses] on the Modern Library's list of "The 100 Best Novels" Ranked 46th on the French Le Monde's list of "The 100 Best Novels in the World” The Great Gatsby is the anthem of the Jazz Age, the decadent twenties' seminal work, and the ultimate novel about the American Dream. It doesn't matter how many times it's adapted into film. Or theater. Or opera. It's through F. Scott Fitzgerald's masterful prose that the story of the ruthless and extravagant Jay Gatsby, narrated by the honest Nick Carraway, continues to live on as the great American classic. F. SCOTT FITZGERALD [1896-1940] was an American author, born in St. Paul, Minnesota. His legendary marriage to Zelda Montgomery, along with their acquaintances with notable figures such as Gertrude Stein and Ernest Hemingway, and their lifestyle in 1920s Paris, has become iconic. A master of the short story genre, it is logical that his most famous novel is also his shortest: The Great Gatsby [1925].