#78 - What could Karl Popper have learned from Vladimir Nabokov? (w/ Brian Boyd)

Increments

Where do you arrive if you follow Vaden's obsessions to their terminus? You arrive at Brian Boyd, the world expert on the two titanic thinkers of the 20th century: Karl Popper and Vladimir Nabokov.

Boyd wrote his PhD thesis on Nabokov's 1969 novel Ada, impressing Nabokov's wife Vera so much that he was invited to catalogue Nabokov's unpublished archives. This led to Boyd's two-volume biography of Nabokov, which Vera kept on her beside table. Boyd also developed an interest in Popper, and began research for his biography in 1996, which was then promptly delayed as he worked on his book, On The Origin of Stories, which we [dedicated episode #50]((https://www.incrementspodcast.com/50) to.

In this episode, we ask Professor Boyd to contrast and compare his two subjects, by addressing the question: What could Karl Popper have learned from Vladimir Nabokov?

We discuss

• How Brian discovered Nabokov
• Did Nabokov have a philosophy?
• Nabokov's life as a scientist
• Was Nabokov simply a writer of puzzles?
• How much should author intentions matter when interpreting literature?

References

• Boyd's book on the evolutionary origins of art and literature: On the Origin of Stories: Evolution, Cognition, and Fiction
• Our episode on the above
• Stalking Nabokov, by Boyd.
• Boyd's book on Pale Fire: Nabokov's Pale Fire: The Magic of Artistic Discovery
• AdaOnline, annotated notes on Ada by Boyd.
• Art historian and one of Popper's close friends, Ernst Gombrich # Errata
• The Burghers of Calais is by Balzac rather than Rodin
• The Nabokov family fled Leningrad rather than Petrograd (as Petersburg had become during WWI).

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Do you love words, or ideas? Email us one but not the other at [email protected].

Special Guest: Brian Boyd.

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