In April 1974, aged 75, Nabokov completed what was to be his last published novel,
Look at the Harlequins!That same month he signed a four-year contract with McGraw-Hill for a further six books – his next novel,
The Original of Laura, which he was ready to start, as well as newly-translated volumes of short stories, his Russian plays, and a selection of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Russian verse. It was as if the completion of
Look at the Harlequins!gave Nabokov a new lease of life: during work on the novel he was preoccupied by a fear that he would not be able to finish it. For the first time in his career he made a point of keeping the index cards on which he composed in their correct order by numbering them, with the stipulation that only those numbered cards could be…
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Citation: Wyllie, Barbara. "Look at the Harlequins!". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 24 April 2007 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=3920, accessed 21 November 2024.]
