Nobokov's Strange World Collides With the Real One.

            This paper has definitely been tedious. The book I chose to read is “Invitation to a Beheading” by Vladimir Nabokov, and let me tell you that just getting through this book can be a process. The book itself is actually good but there are several issues you will come across while reading it. At first, the book makes little sense; you don’t understand exactly what is happening, because the events that take place are so surreal considering his actual environment. As you read on, the books odd situations become normal and you accept them as how the protagonist’s world is.

            The tedium does not end there though. Being that the book was written in Russian, and then translated to English, I have found that some of the grammatical translations are difficult to decipher. There have been a few times I had to reread passages in order to fully comprehend the message that passage was trying to share.

            Tying these 2 books together is extremely difficult, because of the extreme difference between the two novels. Though we do follow the lives of characters in both books, comparing the realism of Nafisi’s world to the surreal world of Nobokov’s protagonist has been difficult. The parallels need to be found in abstract ways in some instances, and finding the parallels between Nobokov’s vision and the Republic of Iran seems to be just as difficult.  

            Finding my outside sources has at least gone smoothly. I have always though that finding information is the easy part, finding ways in which to work those findings into your final product is where things get difficult. Trying to tie together the imaginary with the real, finding imaginary facts and real ones, then tying them together is a strange experience. I have always considered research to be a comparison between two real or two imaginary worlds, rarely have I considered tying the real with the imaginary. This practice has always been something that I have lacked experience in, and because of this I find that this paper is one of the most difficult I have had to write. It’s not just some research project with a bunch of information, but instead a journey through two completely different worlds, searching for any parallels you can find. It is definitely a strange experience.

            The slight difficulties with making it through Nobokov’s novel just add to the difficulty of finding these parallels. Add to that the finding of the parallels between Nobokov’s protagonist and the girls from Nafisi’s novel, and you have quite the task ahead of you. I have been tackling this task for the last two weeks, and while my writing has gone by slowly, I find that I spend more time searching for the miscellaneous parallels rather then writing them down. I believe this shows that this paper is truly a research project, because I still look back to the novels to find the key similarities then use my other references to bolster my claims of the parallels. All I can do is keep at it and finish my first draft by Sunday!