The Feud

I just read the above-titled book by Alex Beam and I really enjoyed it. I’ve been a fan of Beam for a long time; he just has this wonderful equanimous style.

The thing that amazes me is that the book got published at all. It’s subtitle is “Vladimir Nabokov, Edmund Wilson, and the End of a Beautiful Friendship.” Sounds like it would sell about 4 copies. I guess I’m underestimating the number of Nabokov fans out there. In any case, I’m glad that Beam went to the trouble of writing this book and that he got it published. It’s interesting and amusing all the way to the end of the Acknowledgments. OK, the Index is pretty boring, but I guess if you’re gonna write a book about Nabokov, you have to make a choice, and who am I to fault Beam for not entering this particular arena. “A distant northern land.”

I’m an Edmund Wilson fan too—I mean, he’s no George Orwell, or even an Anthony West (see also here), and for that matter I find Diana Trilling and Dwight Macdonald to be much more fun to read as well. But Wilson has some special something.

3 thoughts on “The Feud

  1. On Andrew’s recommendation, I obtained a copy of Beam’s book and it is quite a page-turner. Even if one knows nothing about Pushkin or “Eugene Onegin.” Or, for that matter, Nabokov or Wilson. But with Beam, you have to know English to appreciate his sense of humor and his flair for language.

  2. > I guess I’m underestimating the number of Nabokov fans out there

    Maybe irony is somehow lost on me… But here in Russia, Nabokov’s reprint with seven extra sentences is enough of a news to be reported on a major news site.

    • Mikhail:

      Sure, but I was thinking that to want to read this book you’d have to be interested in both Wilson and Nabokov. There must be very few Wilson fans out there, so if anyone bought The Feud they must be really big fans of Nabokov.

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