( MORE)
AMERICAN LAWYER( cont’ d)
I’ ve already shown you all how Kinbote has tried to convince us that his reality is the one that Shade wished to convey, but here we can clearly see that his idea of reality is entirely separate from ours. His insanity is solidified in his commentary’ s final lines:
( He holds up another poster board, which reads:)
Page 301: " I may.... Cook up a stage play, an old-fashioned melodrama with three principles: a lunatic who intends to kill an imaginary king, another lunatic who imagines himself to be that
king, and a distinguished old poet who stumbles by chance into the line of fire, and perishes in the class between two figments."
JUDGE
Kinbote directly implies that he is a lunatic who had a hand in Shade’ s very natural death.
I must remind the prosecution that Kinbote’ s identity and Shade’ s death are two separate matters.
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