135: “Dr. Olga Repnin“ : see introduction
135: “I loved perambulating a fascinated Isabel through the groves of larches and beeches along Quirn Cascade River“ : In reference to Cascadilla Creek near Cornell University
136: “the afterimage of a wounded orifice.” : In reference to his wife’s return from the ward
136: gall
136: Exile from Mayda: In reference to his anthology of short stories
137: Public Library
137: Paris: Where Nabokov spent time as an émigré writer
137: See Under
137: “photo of a bare-shouldered flapper with a fluffy fan and false eye-lashes in some high-school play, terribly chi-chi.” : Possibly referring to Dolores in her play in Lolita
137: “History of Theatre at Columbia University“
138: Quirn
138: “Paradise was a Persian word. It was simply Persian to meet again like that.”
138: Emerald and the Pander: A faulty memory and rendering of VV’s novel Esmeralda and Her Parandurus.
138: “Aimlessly I walked up and down several halls; abjectly visited the W.C.” : commonly refers to a water closet, a Western commode (a toilet with a Western bowl design), or to a room containing a flush toilet.
138: Lilithan long eyes
138: “Masterpieces” lecture: in reference to the lectures Nabokov gave as a professor on what he deemed as the “masterpieces
139: Quirn University Examination Book
139: As a rule, one-tenth of the three hundred minds preferred the spelling “Stern” to “Sterne” and “Austin” to “Austen”
140: “Krasnaya Niva (“Red Corn”), a Bolshevist magazine.”
140: bermudki: Bermuda Shorts
140: Tant mieux: French expression for “it’s all the better”
140: villa at Canavaux: See Part I Chapter 1
141: “… and we heard little Isabel crow: ‘Ya prosnulas!'”: Russian: “I am awake”
141: “… with the string-bound corpses of caheirs under her sturdy arm”: an exercise book or notebook
141: “… to help me, help me, oh, help me to reach the the Eden of a rainy dawn.”