“There are two kinds of visual memory: one when you skillfully recreate an image in the laboratory of your mind, [...]; and… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
I cannot conceive how anybody in his right mind should go to a psychoanalyst. — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
The more gifted and talkative one's characters are, the greater the chances of their resembling the author in tone or tint of… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“Whatever evolution this or that popular character has gone through between the book covers, his fate is fixed in our minds, and,… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
...that swimming, sloping, elusive something about the dark-bluish tint of the iris which seemed still to retain the shadows it had absorbed… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“I have often noticed that we are inclined to endow our friends with the stability of type that literary characters acquire in… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
My mind speaks English, my heart speaks Russian, and my ear prefers French. — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
…my Lolita remarked: “You know, what’s so dreadful about dying is that you are completely on your own”; and it struck me,… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
Devices which in some curious new way imitate nature are attractive to simple minds. — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
Although we read with our minds, the seat of artistic delight is between the shoulder blades. That little shiver behind is quite… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
The good, the admirable reader identifies himself not with the boy or the girl in the book, but with the mind that… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“His mind was a turmoil of words and fancies, incomplete fancies and insufficient words, but already he knew that this and only… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
There are teachers and students with square minds who are by nature meant to undergo the fascination of catagories. For them, 'schools'… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“We have it all arranged in our minds, and the less often we see a particular person the more satisfying it is… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
Loneliness as a situation can be corrected, but as a state of mind it is an incurable illness. — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“The few times I said to myself anywhere: ‘Now that’s a nice spot for a permanent home,’ I would immediately hear in… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
Why should I tolerate a perfect stranger at the bedside of my mind? — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“There is also a keen pleasure (and after all, what else should the pursuit of science produce?) in meeting the riddle of… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
Complacency is a state of mind that exists only in retrospective: it has to be shattered before being ascertained. — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
My principal failing as a writer is the lack of spontaneity; the nuisance of parallel thoughts, second thoughts, third thoughts; inability to… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“Do all people have that? A face, a phrase, a landscape, an air bubble from the past suddenly floating up as if… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
After the first shock of recognition - a sudden sense of "this is what I'm going to write" - the novel starts… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“A wonderful point in favor of some kind of hereafter is this: When the mind rejects as childishly absurd a paradise with… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“I can only explain my behaviour then by the mechanism of that dream vacuum wherein revolves a deranged mind.” — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“...under no circumstances would he [Humbert Humbert] have interfered with the innocence of a child, if there was the least risk of a row.” — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“Ami azt illeti, Vannak kezdtek nagyon tetszeni a fák is, a csodák is meg az Adák is.” — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
We live not only in a world of thoughts, but also in a world of things. Words without experience are meaningless. — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“It isn’t possible. I cannot imagine it. Come on over here, you foolish little doe, and tell me on what day I shall die.” — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
“Precautions to be taken in the case Of freak reincarnation: what to do On suddenly discovering that you Are now a young and vulnerable… — Vladimir Nabokov Copy Share Image
