Despair

Name: Despair
ISBN: 9787532784981

Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov / 朱世达Shanghai Translation Publishing House · ChinaAug 2020

4.1

Word count: 112K words
Chapters: 13
ISBN: 9787532784981

Report an error Find this book

Summary

Despair is a representative novel by Nabokov, widely recognized as one of the twentieth century's master novelists. It tells how a middle-aged man suffocating in mediocre daily life moves step by step toward self-division. He is a chocolate merchant whose life seems respectable but who indulges in fantasy; his family seems happy, yet he despises his wife from the bottom of his heart; he has excellent artistic taste, but his nature is cruel and ruthless. He rewrites his life through various lies and self-anesthesia, much as a writer carefully fabricates the plot of a novel. In the end, he selects a tramp who looks exactly like him as a double and begins a criminal carnival in the name of art... The “metafictional” technique is brilliantly displayed in this book. This dishonest narrator, as if his soul had left his body, constantly examines himself and gradually exposes his schemes and intentions, drawing readers into the irrational illusory world seen by a paranoid. The book was adapted into a film of the same name in 1978, directed by the new film giant Fassbinder.

Editor's review

Despair is an important work from Nabokov's early Russian-language career, first published in 1934 and later translated into English and revised by the author himself. With its intricate narrative structure and profound thematic exploration, the novel shows the embryo of Nabokov as a master of style. The story revolves around the protagonist Hermann, who encounters a tramp who looks remarkably like him and thereupon plans a murder intended to collect insurance money. On the surface, this is a story about crime and identity substitution, but Nabokov's pen reaches far beyond that. Through Hermann, an unreliable narrator, he peels away layer by layer the psychological world of narcissism, paranoia, and madness, elevating the theme of “despair” from a specific event to an existential philosophical height. The novel is full of Nabokov's signature wordplay, mirror metaphors, and provocative blurring of the boundary between “reality” and “fiction.” Reading Despair, we are not only following the execution and collapse of a criminal plan but also witnessing how a soul trying to resist the void of existence through art—even a distorted, criminal “art”—is ultimately devoured by its own illusions and logic. This provides crucial clues for understanding the core motifs of Nabokov's later masterpieces, such as Lolita and Pale Fire: memory, obsession, artistic creation, and moral ambiguity. This edition from Shanghai Translation Publishing House has a precise translation that restores the rhythm and eerie quality of the original to the greatest extent, making it an excellent key to entering the complex inner universe of this literary giant.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Readers interested in Nabokov's literary world who wish to start with his early works to understand the formation of his style.
Serious literature lovers who prefer psychological analysis, narrative tricks, and existential themes.
Writers and critics interested in studying or practicing the modern fictional technique of the “unreliable narrator.”
Experienced readers able to appreciate cold humor, complex metaphors, and exquisite wordplay.

Not a good fit for

Readers expecting a fast-paced, plot-driven crime story.
Readers impatient with dense interior monologue and strongly philosophical texts.

Reading tips

Try to pay attention to the contradictions and self-glorification in the narrator Hermann's language; this is the key to unlocking his psychological state.
Read the descriptions of the “double” and “mirror” in connection with Nabokov's thinking about art imitating reality.
After finishing, compare it with Dostoevsky's The Double or certain works by Edgar Allan Poe, and consider Nabokov's innovation and subversion on the basis of his predecessors.

About the publisher

Shanghai Translation Publishing House China · Founded in 1978

Shanghai Translation Publishing House is a Chinese publisher oriented mainly toward translation and publishing. Its publications cover foreign literature, world classics and classic works, as well as social culture, folk literature and classical poetry. The database contains 2,618 titles, including Never Let Me Go, Les Misérables (2 volumes), Don Quixote (illustrated collector's edition), The Complete Comedies of Molière (4 volumes), The Complete Novels of Kafka (3 volumes), The Collected Works of Dostoevsky (9-volume set), Reason and Persons, and Oedipus Rex (Translation Classics). Its author resources include foreign writers such as Kazuo Ishiguro, Victor Hugo, Cervantes and Molière, as well as translators such as Zheng Kelu, Sun Jiameng, Li Jianwu and Zhang Kun. The publisher has brands such as "Translation Classics Selections" and "Translation Documentary," and emphasizes translated works in foreign literature and the humanities and social sciences, while also publishing bilingual dictionaries and foreign-language educational books. Public information is limited; the above is based on the book information in the database.

版权信息
前言
一
二
三
四
五
六
七
八
九
一〇
一一

FAQ

What is the connection between this book and Nabokov's more famous Lolita?

Despair likewise explores the unreliability of the narrator, obsessive passion, and criminal psychology, and can be seen as an important rehearsal of the Humbert-type character prototype and complex narrative techniques in Lolita. Both involve a protagonist trying to use a self-consistent logic (or art) to justify abnormal behavior and ultimately failing.

What exactly does “despair” refer to in the novel?

It is both the concrete despair of the protagonist when his plan fails and he is driven into a corner, and a deeper, metaphysical despair: despair arising from the illusion of self-knowledge, from the realization of the impossibility of a perfect crime (or perfect art), and from the existential despair of an individual trying in vain to create meaning in a void world.

How is the translation quality of this edition?

Editions from Shanghai Translation Publishing House generally use translations by experienced translators and are reliable. This translation strives to accurately convey Nabokov's distinctive wordplay and cold, sharp style, and the notes also help readers understand some cultural background and puns, making it a relatively good choice in the Chinese-speaking world.

Comments

Find this book

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov Author · Russian-American · 1899–1977

Vladimir Nabokov was a Russian-born American novelist, poet, translator, and lepidopterist. Born in 1899 into a noble family in St. Petersburg, he went into exile in Europe in 1919, later graduated from Cambridge University, became a U.S. citizen in 1945, and taught at Cornell University; he died in Montreux, Switzerland, in 1977. His work spans novels, short stories, essays, and literary criticism, with major titles including Lolita, Pale Fire, Pnin, and Speak, Memory. His prose is intricate and ornate, marked by irony, wordplay, and unreliable narration, and has deeply influenced modern fictional technique; annotated and guided editions of Lolita and his correspondence collections attest to the continued reach of his work in the Chinese-speaking world.

朱世达 Author

Public information about Zhu Shida is limited, and his nationality, dates of birth and death, and educational background cannot currently be confirmed. Judging from the five works held in the catalog, however, he has been mainly active in the Chinese translation and introduction of foreign literature, especially the works of the Russian-American writer Vladimir Nabokov. His representative translations include the five-volume Selected Works of Nabokov II, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, and Despair. These works are mostly classified as foreign literature and social fiction, dealing with themes such as growth, identity, and human nature, and combining narrative tension with psychological depth. Zhu Shida's translations seek to preserve the style of the originals while maintaining fluent and readable Chinese, offering Chinese readers a relatively reliable access to Nabokov and modern foreign literature.