[A] work of art is inevitably a rendering of emotion, observation, and philosophical speculation in aesthetic terms, or at least in an aesthetic realm. In Nabokov's case it is not that the action or characters of a novel "stand for" or "represent" the writing of a novel or the figure of the artist, but that certain descriptions of experience, character, or emotion illuminate and approximate artistic creation. Though depicted through the medium of creative prose, and frequently compared to the process of creation, Nabokovian characters, plots, and emotions are not mere dramatizations of "ideas" about art; rather they are self-contained worlds which incorporate and reshape the reader's conception of art. (pp. 3-4)

Within this overall theme of artistic creation Nabokov explores the self-creating identity, defining itself through its obsession with an object of passion, or an imagined double, or a compulsively self-regarding prose style. It is not that...