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Available
Call number
Genres
Collection
Publication
Penguin Books Ltd (1990), Edition: New Ed, Paperback, 192 pages
Description
Albinus, a respectable, middle-aged man and aspiring filmmaker, abandons his wife for a lover half his age: Margot, who wants to become a movie star herself. When Albinus introduces her to Rex, an American movie producer, disaster ensues. What emerges is an elegantly sardonic and irresistibly ironic novel of desire, deceit, and deception, a curious romance set in the film world of Berlin in the 1930s.
User reviews
LibraryThing member mike.vaneerden
One of Nabokov's several novels about a sordid affair ending most bizarrely, and of course thoroughly enjoyable throughout. For instance, a favorite sentence(?) that has seemingly nothing whatsoever to do with the flow of the book:
"An electric milk van on fat tires rolling creamily."
It's a 5-star
"An electric milk van on fat tires rolling creamily."
It's a 5-star
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3-star book. That is, for a 3 star book, it gets five stars. The best kind of weekend read. Show Less
LibraryThing member John
In his introduction, John Banville described Laughter in the Dark as a prototype for Lolita. Laughter is the story of a mature, older man (Albinus) who has independent means, dabbles in art history and selling, is happily, if not excitedly, married with an eight year old daughter, who fantasizes
Rex is a psychopath who delights in tormenting people whether they are aware of it or not: "His culture was patchy, but his mind was shrewd and penetrating, and his itch to make fools of his fellow men amounted almost to genius."
It's almost hard to dislike Margot. Even though she is completely amoral, she is using what attributes she has to get what she wants, and those attributes are pretty well restricted to her looks, her body, her youth, her sexuality. The book certainly doesn't go on that long, but you know that Margot is not going to end up with a happy life. She is calculating in the extreme, but least she does not take pleasure in torment, as does Rex.
Albinus is sad. He becomes conscious of the "thin, slimy layer of turpitude which had settled on his life", but cannot rouse himself to correct it, even though there are a couple of chances to do so. You know from the very beginning that this is not going to turn out well, and not just because of the striking first paragraph of the book: "Once upon a time there lived in Berlin, Germany, a man called Albinus. He was rich, respectable, happy; one day he abandoned his wife for the sake of a youthful mistress; he love; was not loved; and his life ended in disaster."
Banville describes Nabakov's style as limpid and it is a good word. Wonderful descriptions such as:
"Berlin West, a morning in May. Men in white caps cleaning the street. Who are they who leave old patent leather boots in the gutter? Sparrows bustling about in the ivy. An electric milk van on fat tires rolling creamily. The sun dazzling in an attic window on the slope of a green-tiled roof. The yong fresh air itself was not yet used to the hooting of the distant traffic; it gently took up the sounds and bore them along like something fragile and precious. In the front gardens the Persian lilac was in bloom. Despite the early coolness white butterflies were already fluttering about as though in a rustic garden. All these things surrounded Albinus as he walked out of the house in which he had spent the night."
And later:
"It was thawing. Bright motorcars were splashing their way through the puddles; at the corner a ragged rapscallion was selling violets; an adventurous Alsatian was insistently following a tiny Pekinese, which snarled, turned and slithered at the end of its leash; a great brilliant slice of the rapid blue sky was mirrored in a glass pane which a bare-armed servant girl was washing vigorously."
And this I love because it captures the image so perfectly: "It was a sunny evening and a little party of midges were continuously darning the air in one spot."
Nabokov also finds time to expostulate on the state of writing at least in Germany , where he was living when he wrote the book in the 30s, when a minor character states that, "if the art of writing and reading is not quite forgotten by then; and I am afraid it is being rather thoroughly forgotten this last half century, in Germany."
Finally, you can't say Nakokov didn't have a sense of humour. When Margot acts in a movie (that Albinus finances) she does so (spectacularly badly)with a blowsy lead actress who glories in the stage name Dorianna Karenina. She says the name was suggested by a boy who committed suicide and when Albinus asks if she has ever read Tolstoy, she replies, "Doll's Toy? No. I'm afraid not. Why?"
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about a more active and more exciting sex life, and who then throws his whole life to the winds to live with a beautiful young girl (16-17 years old) who satisfies all his carnal fantasies, and with whom he believes himself to be in love, not knowing that she (Margot) is simply playing him for his money and his connections (she aspires to be an actress) while shagging an old boyfriend who turns up again (Rex Axel) and who builds a close relationship with Albinus. Albinus had never been lucky in love or lust: "Blunders, gropings, disappointment; surely the Cupid serving him was lefthanded, with a weak chin and no imagination." Towards the end of the book, Albinus is blinded in a car accident which is a nice physical metaphor for the complete moral and intellectual blindness of his life with Margot, not to mention the fact that Margot and Rex carry on literally right under his eyes (even when he does have his eyesight) and even when he stumbles upon evidence of her cupidity and deception, Albinus is only too willing to believe her entreaties of fidelity.Rex is a psychopath who delights in tormenting people whether they are aware of it or not: "His culture was patchy, but his mind was shrewd and penetrating, and his itch to make fools of his fellow men amounted almost to genius."
It's almost hard to dislike Margot. Even though she is completely amoral, she is using what attributes she has to get what she wants, and those attributes are pretty well restricted to her looks, her body, her youth, her sexuality. The book certainly doesn't go on that long, but you know that Margot is not going to end up with a happy life. She is calculating in the extreme, but least she does not take pleasure in torment, as does Rex.
Albinus is sad. He becomes conscious of the "thin, slimy layer of turpitude which had settled on his life", but cannot rouse himself to correct it, even though there are a couple of chances to do so. You know from the very beginning that this is not going to turn out well, and not just because of the striking first paragraph of the book: "Once upon a time there lived in Berlin, Germany, a man called Albinus. He was rich, respectable, happy; one day he abandoned his wife for the sake of a youthful mistress; he love; was not loved; and his life ended in disaster."
Banville describes Nabakov's style as limpid and it is a good word. Wonderful descriptions such as:
"Berlin West, a morning in May. Men in white caps cleaning the street. Who are they who leave old patent leather boots in the gutter? Sparrows bustling about in the ivy. An electric milk van on fat tires rolling creamily. The sun dazzling in an attic window on the slope of a green-tiled roof. The yong fresh air itself was not yet used to the hooting of the distant traffic; it gently took up the sounds and bore them along like something fragile and precious. In the front gardens the Persian lilac was in bloom. Despite the early coolness white butterflies were already fluttering about as though in a rustic garden. All these things surrounded Albinus as he walked out of the house in which he had spent the night."
And later:
"It was thawing. Bright motorcars were splashing their way through the puddles; at the corner a ragged rapscallion was selling violets; an adventurous Alsatian was insistently following a tiny Pekinese, which snarled, turned and slithered at the end of its leash; a great brilliant slice of the rapid blue sky was mirrored in a glass pane which a bare-armed servant girl was washing vigorously."
And this I love because it captures the image so perfectly: "It was a sunny evening and a little party of midges were continuously darning the air in one spot."
Nabokov also finds time to expostulate on the state of writing at least in Germany , where he was living when he wrote the book in the 30s, when a minor character states that, "if the art of writing and reading is not quite forgotten by then; and I am afraid it is being rather thoroughly forgotten this last half century, in Germany."
Finally, you can't say Nakokov didn't have a sense of humour. When Margot acts in a movie (that Albinus finances) she does so (spectacularly badly)with a blowsy lead actress who glories in the stage name Dorianna Karenina. She says the name was suggested by a boy who committed suicide and when Albinus asks if she has ever read Tolstoy, she replies, "Doll's Toy? No. I'm afraid not. Why?"
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LibraryThing member gergacheck
Laughter in the Dark is in many ways Nabokov's rehearsal for the great American works of his later period of English writing. Plot-wise, we get a version of the middle-aged-man-paired-with-a-significantly-younger-girl-which-ends-with-a-murder scenario and the elaborate charades found in Lolita, as
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well as the obsessive descriptions of love found in Ada. This early novel, however, doesn't quite have the style of the familiar Nabokov--the tenderness, the care, the prose's exquisite frivolity and playfullness--but is still nevertheless thoroughly enjoyable. Perhaps something of the indulgence felt in his originally English works is lost in the translation from the Russian here, but I get the feeling that Nabokov's style was still emerging, not yet consumed by the sensuousness of language. In later Nabokov we get the complexity and elaborate jive of Lolita, the cleverness and ambiguity of Pale Fire, and the voluptuous and almost sublime language of Ada--but not here, not quite arrived at yet in Laughter in the Dark. Of course none of this means that you shouldn't read this work; just don't expect to get everything Nabokov gives you in his mature, English works. So read it, please. After all, this is still Nabokov we're talking about here. Show Less
LibraryThing member RandyMetcalfe
As the narrator of Laughter in the Dark notes, “although there is plenty of space on a gravestone to contain…a man’s life, detail is always welcome.” Here the details of the life and death of Albert Albinus begin with smug self satisfaction and ennui, degrade into unrequited lust, collapse
Albert is a middle-aged man in Berlin between the wars, who is comfortably middle-class. But his predilection is for very young women — very young — and despite restraining that impulse throughout his marriage to Elizabeth, he is tempted when he encounters young Margot ushering at a local cinema. To Albert she is all that innocence implies. Alas, Margot is far less, or more, and quickly settles on Albert as her ticket out of poverty and possibly into life on the other side of the silver screen. It’s all a bit sordid but mundane. However, when Margot’s first and only true love, Axel, turns up, complications ensue. Fortunately Axel is quite willing to borrow Margot’s affection at Albert’s expense and their shenanigans engender the laughter in the dark of the title.
This is a light romp that doesn’t stand up against Nabokov’s more serious comedies. But it does reveal that even early in his career he was already full of mirth at the expense of many of his characters and quite willing to point the finger at his readers as well.
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in fits of self delusion, farce, and debauchery, and end in self recrimination, cuckoldry, and murder. And while you might have been just as enriched by the tombstone version of his life, there is something of a brisk tour-de-force in Nabokov’s willingness to give himself over to the absurdities of his plot and, more especially, of his characters.Albert is a middle-aged man in Berlin between the wars, who is comfortably middle-class. But his predilection is for very young women — very young — and despite restraining that impulse throughout his marriage to Elizabeth, he is tempted when he encounters young Margot ushering at a local cinema. To Albert she is all that innocence implies. Alas, Margot is far less, or more, and quickly settles on Albert as her ticket out of poverty and possibly into life on the other side of the silver screen. It’s all a bit sordid but mundane. However, when Margot’s first and only true love, Axel, turns up, complications ensue. Fortunately Axel is quite willing to borrow Margot’s affection at Albert’s expense and their shenanigans engender the laughter in the dark of the title.
This is a light romp that doesn’t stand up against Nabokov’s more serious comedies. But it does reveal that even early in his career he was already full of mirth at the expense of many of his characters and quite willing to point the finger at his readers as well.
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LibraryThing member Karlus
Of all Nabokov's varied novels, this one might best be summarized with the single thought, "page-turner." And what a page-turner it is!
When a respectably-married and wealthy middle-aged man catches sight of an attractive 16-year-old female usher in a Berlin movie house, all life changes and is no
In this book, in a different narrative style from many of the author's other novels, the story emerges rapidly and moves right along in short clear sentences. Nabokov allows the point-of-view to shift quickly among the principal characters as we catch them in mid-conversation and hear their thoughts directly in first-person. Soon enough, we know all about the good guys and the bad guys and, in effect, we see all the plot puzzle-pieces face up on the table. When a gun suddenly appears, then the stakes are raised, and it becomes a serious task for the reader to try to foresee the end of the story and how the puzzle will all fit together.
Come then, if you wish, and try your hand against the Master Puzzler. Guess the end, if you can -- before he tells you, of course.
When a respectably-married and wealthy middle-aged man catches sight of an attractive 16-year-old female usher in a Berlin movie house, all life changes and is no
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longer the same for anyone. As friends and relatives, crooks and scam artists, bus drivers and acquaintances enter the picture, and plot twists and surprises follow one another on nearly every page, the reader soon finds himself almost breathless trying to keep up with the perfidy that unfolds.In this book, in a different narrative style from many of the author's other novels, the story emerges rapidly and moves right along in short clear sentences. Nabokov allows the point-of-view to shift quickly among the principal characters as we catch them in mid-conversation and hear their thoughts directly in first-person. Soon enough, we know all about the good guys and the bad guys and, in effect, we see all the plot puzzle-pieces face up on the table. When a gun suddenly appears, then the stakes are raised, and it becomes a serious task for the reader to try to foresee the end of the story and how the puzzle will all fit together.
Come then, if you wish, and try your hand against the Master Puzzler. Guess the end, if you can -- before he tells you, of course.
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LibraryThing member szarka
Scarier than any horror novel could be. More thrilling than any thriller, despite being told the end at the start.
LibraryThing member CarlosMcRey
An early Nabokov novel about a man named Albinus, a well-to-do German businessman who becomes infatuated with a callow younger woman. There are some similarities here with Pandora's Box or 'Der Blaue Engel' (for fans of Weimar Cinema) in this story of a rather pompous individual brought low by his
Overall, it's a fairly tragic story, as Albinus loses first his marriage, then his daughter, then, in quick succession, his sight, dignity, fortune and life. It has its moments of humor and unique prose. Though hardly as brilliant or radical as Nabokov's later works, Laughter in the Dark is still a well-crafted narrative of one man's folly.
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romantic entanglement with a younger woman.Overall, it's a fairly tragic story, as Albinus loses first his marriage, then his daughter, then, in quick succession, his sight, dignity, fortune and life. It has its moments of humor and unique prose. Though hardly as brilliant or radical as Nabokov's later works, Laughter in the Dark is still a well-crafted narrative of one man's folly.
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LibraryThing member dczapka
Laughter in the Dark is a fascinating book in the oeuvre of Nabokov, for a number of reasons. It is, in a sense, vintage Nabokov, so meticulously composed that Nabokov, upon seeing its original translation as Camera Obscura, proceeded with his own translation because the first attempt was so poor.
The novel traces the life of Albinus, a man whose career as an art critic is pretty straightforward if blasé. Upon meeting Margot, a 16-year-old bombshell, at the cinema, he becomes immediately enraptured and pursues her with an unusual aggressiveness. But as he becomes more enthralled with the young nymphet, he grows increasingly oblivious to the fact that his life is falling apart around him, and he grows blind to the machinations of Margot, who, in cahoots with the scheming producer Axel Rex, have designs on leaving the poor Albinus in ruins.
What makes the novel so fun to read is that, despite its very deliberate construction, it seems clear from the start that Nabokov is not taking things too seriously. Albinus, though seriously deluded, is treated through much of the novel as a man who has no idea what he is doing, whose one-track mind makes him ripe to be duped and ripe to be lampooned. Margot, likewise, plays such an effective and deliberately typed character, as a faux damsel in distress, that even at her most vicious, she is laughable.
The plot too moves at such a brisk pace that it keeps the reader's attention throughout. The early portions of the novel, as Albinus attempts to woo Margot, are paced very deliberately, but not so slow that the reader becomes impatient. Once the affair reaches its apex and begins spiraling out of control, the pacing shifts to accommodate this, adding a whimsical flair to the otherwise dour developments. And by the strange but appropriate ending, in which the novel's title becomes clear, we once more marvel at how Nabokov paces the suspense to keep things fresh and hold the reader's attention. From start to finish, the pace matches the action to a T, which makes the book so irresistible to read.
It is often Nabokov's curse to be reduced to the realm of "serious" and "erudite" novels. And while his work is meticulous in this regard, Laughter in the Dark proves unequivocally that he is capable of masterful work even at his less serious. The novel's laughs never cheapen the fact that it reads like a work that is as well-planned and perfectly executed as any of his more well-known works. I approached Laughter in the Dark expecting a cheap, tawdry thrill--what I got was an unexpectedly strong work that easily ranks among the master's best.
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It deals with a familiar Nabokovian theme in its treatment of a man in love with an underaged girl. But unlike much Nabokov, it is incredibly amusing and spectacularly fun. And so, it is as vintage Nabokov as one can ask for, since it is an unmitigated pleasure to read.The novel traces the life of Albinus, a man whose career as an art critic is pretty straightforward if blasé. Upon meeting Margot, a 16-year-old bombshell, at the cinema, he becomes immediately enraptured and pursues her with an unusual aggressiveness. But as he becomes more enthralled with the young nymphet, he grows increasingly oblivious to the fact that his life is falling apart around him, and he grows blind to the machinations of Margot, who, in cahoots with the scheming producer Axel Rex, have designs on leaving the poor Albinus in ruins.
What makes the novel so fun to read is that, despite its very deliberate construction, it seems clear from the start that Nabokov is not taking things too seriously. Albinus, though seriously deluded, is treated through much of the novel as a man who has no idea what he is doing, whose one-track mind makes him ripe to be duped and ripe to be lampooned. Margot, likewise, plays such an effective and deliberately typed character, as a faux damsel in distress, that even at her most vicious, she is laughable.
The plot too moves at such a brisk pace that it keeps the reader's attention throughout. The early portions of the novel, as Albinus attempts to woo Margot, are paced very deliberately, but not so slow that the reader becomes impatient. Once the affair reaches its apex and begins spiraling out of control, the pacing shifts to accommodate this, adding a whimsical flair to the otherwise dour developments. And by the strange but appropriate ending, in which the novel's title becomes clear, we once more marvel at how Nabokov paces the suspense to keep things fresh and hold the reader's attention. From start to finish, the pace matches the action to a T, which makes the book so irresistible to read.
It is often Nabokov's curse to be reduced to the realm of "serious" and "erudite" novels. And while his work is meticulous in this regard, Laughter in the Dark proves unequivocally that he is capable of masterful work even at his less serious. The novel's laughs never cheapen the fact that it reads like a work that is as well-planned and perfectly executed as any of his more well-known works. I approached Laughter in the Dark expecting a cheap, tawdry thrill--what I got was an unexpectedly strong work that easily ranks among the master's best.
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LibraryThing member gbill
I love the opening line to “Laughter in the Dark”, which pretty much sums it up:
“Once upon a time there lived in Berlin, Germany, a man called Albinus. He was rich, respectable, happy; one day he abandoned his wife for the sake of a youthful mistress; he loved; was not loved; and his life
This is the whole of the story and we might have left it at that had there not been profit and pleasure in the telling; and although there is plenty of space on a gravestone to contain, bound in moss, the abridged version of a man’s life, detail is always welcome.”
Some of that detail: Albinus ends up completely used by Margot, his young lover. He does ridiculous things, like missing his own daughter’s funeral. She cheats on him in turn with Rex, who takes full advantage and pushes the limit sadistically. One feels pity for Albinus as he quite literally ends up in the dark, mocked and utterly humiliated; on the other hand, there is a sense of justice in the cuckolding.
Quotes:
On beauty:
“And alongside of these feeble romances there had been hundreds of girls of whom he had dreamed but whom he had never got to know; they had just slid past him, leaving for a day or two that hopeless sense of loss which makes beauty what it is: a distant lone tree against golden heavens; ripples of light on the inner curve of a bridge; a thing quite impossible to capture.”
I love this playful description of somewhat random items from a wedding:
“They were married in Munich in order to escape the onslaught of their many Berlin acquaintances. The chestnuts were in full bloom. A much treasured cigarette case was lost in a forgotten garden. One of the waiters at the hotel could speak seven languages. Elisabeth proved to have a tender little scar – the result of appendicitis.”
On a reality check in the May-September romance:
“In a passing mirror he saw a pale grave gentleman walking beside a schoolgirl in her Sunday dress. Cautiously, he stroked her smooth arm and the glass drew dim.”
On sex:
“This had been the night of which he had dreamed for years. The very way in which she had drawn her shoulder blades together and purred when he first kissed her downy back had told him that he would get exactly what he wanted, and what he wanted was not the chill of innocence. As in his most reckless visions, everything was permissible; a puritan’s love, priggish reserve, was less known in this new free world than white bears in Honolulu.
Her nudity was as natural as though she had long been wont to run along the shore of his dreams. There had been something delightfully acrobatic about her bed manners. And afterward she would skip out and prance up and down the room, swinging her girlish hips and gnawing at a dry roll left over from supper.”
On settling:
“To Margot’s credit it must be admitted that she did try her utmost to remain quite faithful to him. But not matter how tender and thoughtful he was in his love-making, she knew, all along, that for her it would always be love minus something, whereas the least touch of her first lover had always been a sample of everything.”
On the shock of discovering an affair:
“He had the obscure sensation of everything’s being suddenly turned the other way round, so that he had to read it all backward if he wanted to understand. It was a sensation devoid of any pain or astonishment. It was simply something dark and looming, and yet smooth and soundless, coming toward him; and there he stood, in a kind of dreamy, helpless stupor, not even trying to avoid that ghostly impact, as if it were some curious phenomenon which could do him no harm so long as this stupor lasted.”
“Once upon a time there lived in Berlin, Germany, a man called Albinus. He was rich, respectable, happy; one day he abandoned his wife for the sake of a youthful mistress; he loved; was not loved; and his life
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ended in disaster. This is the whole of the story and we might have left it at that had there not been profit and pleasure in the telling; and although there is plenty of space on a gravestone to contain, bound in moss, the abridged version of a man’s life, detail is always welcome.”
Some of that detail: Albinus ends up completely used by Margot, his young lover. He does ridiculous things, like missing his own daughter’s funeral. She cheats on him in turn with Rex, who takes full advantage and pushes the limit sadistically. One feels pity for Albinus as he quite literally ends up in the dark, mocked and utterly humiliated; on the other hand, there is a sense of justice in the cuckolding.
Quotes:
On beauty:
“And alongside of these feeble romances there had been hundreds of girls of whom he had dreamed but whom he had never got to know; they had just slid past him, leaving for a day or two that hopeless sense of loss which makes beauty what it is: a distant lone tree against golden heavens; ripples of light on the inner curve of a bridge; a thing quite impossible to capture.”
I love this playful description of somewhat random items from a wedding:
“They were married in Munich in order to escape the onslaught of their many Berlin acquaintances. The chestnuts were in full bloom. A much treasured cigarette case was lost in a forgotten garden. One of the waiters at the hotel could speak seven languages. Elisabeth proved to have a tender little scar – the result of appendicitis.”
On a reality check in the May-September romance:
“In a passing mirror he saw a pale grave gentleman walking beside a schoolgirl in her Sunday dress. Cautiously, he stroked her smooth arm and the glass drew dim.”
On sex:
“This had been the night of which he had dreamed for years. The very way in which she had drawn her shoulder blades together and purred when he first kissed her downy back had told him that he would get exactly what he wanted, and what he wanted was not the chill of innocence. As in his most reckless visions, everything was permissible; a puritan’s love, priggish reserve, was less known in this new free world than white bears in Honolulu.
Her nudity was as natural as though she had long been wont to run along the shore of his dreams. There had been something delightfully acrobatic about her bed manners. And afterward she would skip out and prance up and down the room, swinging her girlish hips and gnawing at a dry roll left over from supper.”
On settling:
“To Margot’s credit it must be admitted that she did try her utmost to remain quite faithful to him. But not matter how tender and thoughtful he was in his love-making, she knew, all along, that for her it would always be love minus something, whereas the least touch of her first lover had always been a sample of everything.”
On the shock of discovering an affair:
“He had the obscure sensation of everything’s being suddenly turned the other way round, so that he had to read it all backward if he wanted to understand. It was a sensation devoid of any pain or astonishment. It was simply something dark and looming, and yet smooth and soundless, coming toward him; and there he stood, in a kind of dreamy, helpless stupor, not even trying to avoid that ghostly impact, as if it were some curious phenomenon which could do him no harm so long as this stupor lasted.”
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LibraryThing member numbernine
Nabakov is about as good as it gets, and Laughter in the Dark might be my favorite book of his so far. Awful things happening to thoroughly unlikeable people.
LibraryThing member robeik
Interesting short novel, set in the 1930s, mostly in Berlin. The first lines of the book give it away, but how that works itself out is then revealed. A sad story really, and although fiction, I imagine it's the structure of many cases of infidelity and 'affairs'.
LibraryThing member jeffome
Wow....enjoyed this way more than i expected! However, it was sort of like watching a horrible train wreck in slow motion.....but it was enticing enough that i thought it cannot continue to go this way....something's gotta give....so i just kept vigorously plowing through.....waiting,
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hoping......but without giving this away, i was a little surprised by the ending. This is a study of strength & weakness, putting things off so much, there is no ability to go back......a story of pathetic manipulation......and one that is sadly far too common still in today's society.......Emptiness = bad..... recommended if you can handle a little 'dark'. Show Less
LibraryThing member cakecop
Excellent story, well written, great characters.
LibraryThing member ltbxf4
You know there is going to be a train wreck, you don't like any of the characters, but you don't look away.
LibraryThing member lethalmauve
"I must keep quiet for a little space and then walk very slowly along that bright sand of pain, towards that blue, blue wave. What bliss there is in blueness. I never knew how blue blueness could be. What a mess life has been. Now I know everything. Coming, coming, coming to drown me. There it is.
Starts off by summarizing the whole narrative of the novel without entirely jeopardizing the impact of the detailed narrative, Laughter in the Dark is such a splendid tragicomedy. Dry humor keeps the otherwise overtly familiar plot interesting and engaging. With most of its characters tied to the magic of films and film-making, its entirety could be treated as such: an almost hilarious, horrific, and hypnotic take on a film genre that hasn't got, possibly, a term for itself. It's a mixture of horror, film noir, thriller, drama, comedy, romance, slasher, and mockumentary while diligently preserving realism at best amidst the idealism of its characters. It is another of Nabokov's tale of a middle aged man, Albinus, pining, wooing, and worshipping a 17-year old girl of filth (though both of them are filth), naïvety and deceit but this time, depending on how you look into it, the girl gains the upper hand. Albinus' decent down the misery and misfortune well was unapologetically satisfying. Laughter in the Dark made me, pardon me for this, laugh in the dark as I turn the final pages realizing I've devoured it all in one day. It is, indeed, quite a cinematic experience on its own.
Some stunning excerpts from the master word-weaver, Nabokov:
** "No, you can't take a pistol and plug a girl you don't even know, simply because she attracts you."
** "One can't build up one's life on the quicksands of misfortune."
** "In my opinion, an artist must let himself be guided solely by his sense of beauty: that will never deceive him."
** "Death seems to be merely a bad habit, which nature is at present powerless to overcome."
** "Solitude has developed in him a spinsterish touchiness, and now he was deriving a morbid pleasure from feeling hurt."
** "Death is often the point of life's joke."
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How it hurts. I can't breathe..."Starts off by summarizing the whole narrative of the novel without entirely jeopardizing the impact of the detailed narrative, Laughter in the Dark is such a splendid tragicomedy. Dry humor keeps the otherwise overtly familiar plot interesting and engaging. With most of its characters tied to the magic of films and film-making, its entirety could be treated as such: an almost hilarious, horrific, and hypnotic take on a film genre that hasn't got, possibly, a term for itself. It's a mixture of horror, film noir, thriller, drama, comedy, romance, slasher, and mockumentary while diligently preserving realism at best amidst the idealism of its characters. It is another of Nabokov's tale of a middle aged man, Albinus, pining, wooing, and worshipping a 17-year old girl of filth (though both of them are filth), naïvety and deceit but this time, depending on how you look into it, the girl gains the upper hand. Albinus' decent down the misery and misfortune well was unapologetically satisfying. Laughter in the Dark made me, pardon me for this, laugh in the dark as I turn the final pages realizing I've devoured it all in one day. It is, indeed, quite a cinematic experience on its own.
Some stunning excerpts from the master word-weaver, Nabokov:
** "No, you can't take a pistol and plug a girl you don't even know, simply because she attracts you."
** "One can't build up one's life on the quicksands of misfortune."
** "In my opinion, an artist must let himself be guided solely by his sense of beauty: that will never deceive him."
** "Death seems to be merely a bad habit, which nature is at present powerless to overcome."
** "Solitude has developed in him a spinsterish touchiness, and now he was deriving a morbid pleasure from feeling hurt."
** "Death is often the point of life's joke."
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Language
Original language
Russian
Original publication date
1932
Physical description
192 p.; 7.72 inches
ISBN
0140181652 / 9780140181654