Date of Award

2017

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Bachelors

Department

Humanities

First Advisor

Wyman, Alina

Area of Concentration

Russian Language and Literature

Abstract

In this thesis, I intend to examine the presence of doubles and doubling in Mary, Despair, and Invitation to a Beheading, three of Vladimir Nabokov’s Russian novels. I have selected these novels in part due to their belonging to Nabokov’s Russian oeuvre, and due to the presence of doubles and doubling that I have located and described within them. My study refers only to the English translations. The presence of doubles and doubling within these novels warrants a thorough investigation because in certain cases they are never explicitly identified as “doubles,” or even “false doubles,” although the reader discovers indications of their false originality. Furthermore, Nabokov’s vehement denial of doubles within his novels raises questions about trusting authorial interpretation. Nabokov’s public denial of the existence of doubles in his novels provoked me to conduct an in-depth examination of these novels, and question why he would want to mask their presence in the first place.

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