Pale Fire: Illustrated Sports Illustrated Sports Pale Fire Journal | Page 103

sense of wonder whenever [he] looked at him.” (27). Hazel and Kinbote are both
also of a questionable mental state, and Shade mentioned that Hazel “always
nursed a small mad hope.” (line 383). Kinbote had been said to hallucinate in
the past (98), and Hazel was interested in ghostly entities she claims she commu-
nicated with (188). They were both into the strange phenomenon of switching
words around, such as changing “spider” into “redips” (line 348), or “T.S. Elliot”
into “toilest” (193). This is a strange habit that both Kinbote and Hazel were
said to have shared with Shade, as Kinbote is quoted as saying that “it was I who
one day, when [Shade and I] were discussing ‘mirror words,’ observed that
“spider” in reverse is “redips” (193). When Kinbote acknowledged this similar
quality between him and Hazel, he states that “It is also true that Hazel Shade
resembled me in certain respects.” (193). Kinbote and Hazel are also both deeply
into literature and words. Kinbote is a literature professor at a university, and
deeply admires works of literature. Hazel, conversely, would also always ask her
father what certain words meant (such as “chtonic” and “sempiternal”) (line
372), and liked to write about things that interested her (187). It is possible that
both Hazel and Kinbote were “the shadow of the waxwing slain” (line 1).
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