sembled [ him ] in some respects ” ( 193 ), even though she was a young woman and he was a middle-aged man . Kinbote also described the character of Disa as bearing “ a singular resemblance not , of course , to Mrs . Shade as she was when I met her , but to the idealized and stylized picture painted by the poet ” ( 207 ). John Shade describes himself as resembling the “ slapdash disheveled hat who ladles out the mash in the Levin Hall cafeteria ,” and others claim she resembles Judge Goldsworth - so by extension , Shade resembles Goldsworth ( 267 ). These direct comparisons , combined with the repeated words scattered throughout the novel , strengthen the idea that various characters are “ played ” by the same person - or at least should be in the reader ’ s mind - even when their stories and physical descriptions are completely different . This concept is abstract and not grounded in narrative realism , but it achieves the same effect as repeating actors in different roles on a stage ; the audience feels something familiar between characters that aren ’ t necessarily a part of each other ’ s story , and those feelings create meanings - each of which are still openended and free for interpretation - better than if the characters were completely separate .
Nabokov uses the intricacies of language and form to create a story that rejects at-
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