''Vladimir Nabokov's Comic Quest for Reality' - Nottingham eTheses

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215
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pattern of his future himself.
He imagines he is a participant in the game of chess
that is his life, and tries to trick his opponent:
Already the day before he had thought of
an interesting device, a device with which
he could, perhaps, foil the designs of his
mysterious opponent. The device consisted
in voluntarily committing some absurd unexpected
act that would be outside the systematic
order of life, thus confronting the sequence
of moves planned by his opponent. It
was an experimental defence... (191).
But whoever his opponent is will not be fdoled. From
what happens it appears that Luzhin's move has been
foreseen and taken into account. His defence proves to
be erroneous and the development that he has feared
is almost brought to its fatal conclusion.
It becomes apparent that Luzhin is not so much a
player at the board as a piece on the board, moved
about at will and with a definite purpose by the mys-
terious powers playing the game. His art may, in fact,
allow him an insight into the pattern and working of
fate, the rules and moves being the same in both. But
though he is free to move the pieces on the little
board, he has no power to interfere in "the game of
the gods" (32), in which he is himself no more than a
tiny chessman and in which his fate is shaped.
The feeling of absolute helplessness and despair
that comes over him with the realization of
allows of only one way of action,
. this fact
namely, "to drop out
of the game" (198) in order to be
saved.
Ironically,
the last thing he perceives when
bathroom window into eternity, is
underlying design does not differ
he jumps from his
that apparently its
at all from what he