Connolly is Professor of Slavic Language and Literature at the University of Virginia. In the following excerpt, he offers an interpretation of the theme of "A Guide to Berlin," emphasizing Nabokov's development of imagery.

Nabokov's most comprehensive statement about the value of remaining receptive to the everyday flow of life and of establishing channels of communication with external others arises in the unusual sketch entitled "A Guide to Berlin." Published in December 1925, this sketch is the only one of the period to have an overtly programmatic orientation. While most of the early works revolve around a protagonist's preoccupation with the absence of a beloved other, this work has a different focus: the relationship of the writer to the outside world and to his potential audience. Nabokov's treatment of the self-other relationship here establishes principles which remain in force throughout his literary career.

The sketch consists of an...