u/BatemanMonsterFucker

Another Nabokov rant here waow.

Let me start by stating Nabokov is probably my favorite writer of all time. I have genuinely cried because some of his sentences where so beautifully composed.

BUT he does one thing that just left a bad taste my mouth in almost every single one of his novels I have read. He will take inventory of some university department or other group of intellectuals and just tell you how much he hates Dostoyevsky and Freud. It's okay man I get it, please go back to making to telling me about whatever russian migrant you are writing about this time.

I get that part of his appeal is that he inserts himself as the author into his writings noticeably, making you aware of its artificiality. But his side tangents on his least favorite writers always seem a little less clever than anything else he writes, sometimes even bitter.

Its gotten to the point where I started wondering if this was on purpose. His famous dislike for psychoanalysis always seemed to me a little contradictory because his work features so many neurotic characters that can not help but reveal something deeper about themselves in their compulsive narration. Is it possible that his anti-freudism was an act, a kind of meta-puzzle to throw people off even more when trying to explore within his work? (Probably not)

Im Gespräch mit älteren vaguely linken Leuten fallen immer wieder so Sätze wie "wenn wir doch nur solche Leute heute hätten" und auch in Kommentarsektionen im Netz fallen ähnliche Aussagen.

Ich fühle mich ein bisschen ambivalent gegenüber diesen Aussagen. Natürlich ist eine charismatische Persönlichkeit nie schlecht für eine politische Bewegung, andererseits sind diese Leute auch nicht vom Himmel ins Kanzleramt gefallen, sondern ihre Kanzlerschaften waren natürlich das Resultat historischer Prozesse etc. pp. Grundsätzlich sind mir so Personenkulte einfach ein bisschen suspekt, vorallem weil es mir vorkommt als wäre die implizite Aussage hinter dee oben genannten ein bisschen "wenn wir doch nur einen starken Mann hätten".

Abgesehen davon kann ich aber die beiden kaum über die basic Geschichtsunterrichtsfakten bewerten. Ich dachte ich frag hier mal wie ihr die beiden seht und vllt ob ihr empfehlungen für Resourcen habt (Dokus, Biographien, whatever) die helfen würden einen genaueren Überblick über die zwei Herren und ihre Zeit zu bekommen.

Hello, i'm studying ancient greek in germany with the goal of taking an exam requiring translating passages from Plato & Xenophon. I've been using the list of vocab that comes with my text book (Kantharos) as well as a vocab list specifically designed for studying Plato and a shorter one meant for Xenophon. It comes out at ~1600 words total.

I'd like to expand my vocabulary beyond the scope I've got now while still keeping the goal of the coming exam in mind. What do you recommend? Are the any "intermediate" vocab lists out there?